Oh dear Benjie,You appear to be following in the footsteps of Cllr Taylor with false accusations built around a complete lack of knowledge.Indeed it is a Labour manifesto commitment to introduce a scheme that will reward communities for recycling – well done on reading that part of our election document.However, the scheme must be implemented in a way that is right for this borough and had you read on, you would have noticed another manifesto commitment NOT to introduce chips to our bins.If anything, it is the CON-DEM government who have recently praised and are trying to promote the intrusive chip-based rewards system in places such as Conservative Windsor, where each and every green box is measured invasively and laboriously.Unlike the CON-DEM government we will actually be sticking to our manifesto pledges: our plans will not be intrusive or use chips.If through your misplaced comments you are suggesting that you do not wish to support the scheme, when introduced, then I am sure your residents in Hanger Hill will be interested to know that you are denying them the opportunity for any extra funding.It’s a shame that your own manifesto was so thin on the ground when it came to actual on-the-ground proposals to boost recycling across the borough – poor show that you’d run out of ideas after only four years.As for the false accusations in the rest of your post, it perhaps represents more of a chip on your shoulder than any smidgen of reality. It also reflects the two-faced nature that your party is adopting in opposition; with your group leader fully supporting my proposals at cabinet – now it appears you do not want to see an improved ‘clean and green’ contract for Ealing. There are no proposals to remove independent monitoring for the current or any future contract, unless you are suggesting that this is what you want. As Cabinet member responsible I will ensure that any future monitoring remains independent and targets are challenging.You allude that tendering for the new contract would help us chip bins too… I appreciate that you are a new councillor and you are eager to score some political points but it would appear a little over eager: chips for black bin bags??? Not sure how that would work. Perhaps you have already drawn up plans on how the Conservatives would have delivered it had you won the elections. In any such case, I’m not interested in seeing such proposals because I have no such plans to go ahead with such a move.The only chips I want to see in bins are potato chips, recycled through our new kitchen caddies, which are being rolled out from tomorrow onwards. They are small caddies which can be kept in peoples’ kitchens and help everyone collect peelings, left over food, etc into before putting into the bigger kitchen caddy which can be left outside ahead of collection for recycling. We know that food in black bin bags can attract foxes, birds and vermin. By rolling these small caddies out, we can help reduce the amount of food in our black bags and sent to landfill.If you decide you want to have a grown up conversation about recycling and waste collection then I’m ready to listen.Yours sincerely,Cllr Bassam MahfouzCabinet Member for Environment & Transport
Bassam Mahfouz ● 5940d