SPEND, SPEND, SPEND

A couple of years ago, new and enthusiastic back-bencher Mariam Dawood proposed a motion to the Labour Group on the council.

The motion sought to remove the charges for the removal of bulky household goods, fridges, sofas etc.

So far so good. It was a policy which had been introduced under the Wales administration and then discontinued in favour of a charge towards the cost of removing bulky household goods of £20. The charge was introduced because of the financial stresses on the authority.

The new policy would allow for two collections from an address per year and up to five items per collection. Members of the Labour Group were sure that this was a vote-winner, the council was offering free collections. It would also cut down on fly tipping, surely. The enthusiastic councillors don’t seem to have asked the question about how much this would cost. Or perhaps they don’t see that as their business.

Well, the good news is that it has cut down on fly tips, by 3,741 on the previous year. The bad news is that there were still 9,615 more fly-tips in the year 2019-20 than there were in the year 2017-18. 

More bad news, for your pockets at least, is that the number of bulky waste collections have shot up by over 140% in one year from under 16,000 to over 37,000.

We would like to tell you how much this is costing, but we can’t. Newham Council don’t know the costs!

So, using the cheapest commercial removals as a guide, at £70 per pick-up this equates to a bill to Newham Council, and you the council tax payer, of £2,608,130. An increase in one year of £1,508,010. This is a direct result of the new policy. 

In addition, if the £20 charge had remained (and the numbers were constant) there would have been an income to the council of £430,860.

This brilliant initiative has cost you, the taxpayer £2m a year in additional costs and lost income. No wonder they struggle to balance the books.

In fairness, we should offset the savings from a reduced number of fly-tips at 3761 x £70, giving £263,270. So here are the costs for one year.

In cash terms they are spending almost £2m a year more than when Mayor Fiazco took office.  

Is the ‘service improvement’ that you are getting worth £2m? Have you even noticed it?

If the costings are incorrect, we would be delighted to hear from Newham Council and we will adjust them. However, given that they could not tell us the costs when we submitted an FOI, we would like to know how they have calculated them.