South Holland District Council leader ‘not afraid’ to introduce wheelie bins… but says he will only do so if residents demand it

Council leader Nick Worth says he isn’t afraid to introduce wheelie bins to the district - but only if there is enough demand from residents.

South Holland is the only authority in Lincolnshire which still operates a bin bag collection service, but all that could change following the launch of a hotly-anticipated public consultation this week.

Households are being given the chance to say whether they want to stick with the current refuse sack service or wheel out the bins.

“I don’t mind making change. People don’t always like change but the reality is that change is a constant in life,” Coun Worth told LincsOnline in a recent interview.

“If I have to make a difficult decision I will.”

However, Coun Worth added that this change will only happen if it’s what residents want.

“I’ll be intrigued to see what the response is,” he added.

“If it comes back 50-50 I’ll probably stay where we are. If it comes down strongly in favour of bins then I don’t mind making the hard decision.”

The wheelie bin question has long created a passionate debate in South Holland.

Some ratepayers are sick of having the contents of their refuse sacks scattered across the street as animals and birds rip them apart attempting to get to the waste inside.

It has also been claimed that rows of bin bags on streets is unsightly.

But other residents argue change would be bad for them, citing issues such as terrace houses not having space for a bin to be kept at the rear of the property, meaning they would remain constantly in the street.

Elderly residents have raised concerns about struggling to pull heavy bins across gravelled drives.

There is also a debate about the volume of waste as there is no limit to the amount of refuse sacks residents can leave out.

However, with bins households cannot dump any additional waste once the bin is full.

Coun Worth says these issues, as well as the contrasting town and country lifestyles in the district, will be looked into before any decision is made.

“We’ll be asking residents for their postcode as we want to see whether the pro-bin brigade are town centre, rural or what?” he said.

“Even if we did go down the bins route, there would still be bags as, where you’ve got flats for example, you can’t always have bins in those situations.

“There are some areas you’ll still need bags.

“For me people who come into the area want bins as its what they’re used to it while people who have always lived here prefer bags.”

The bin debate has been accelerated by reforms introduced earlier this year by the previous Government forcing all authorities to bring in separate food waste collections by March 2026 in a bid to raise recycling rates.

This would be a weekly collection in a small bin.

"This means we need specialist vans or vehicles to collect it,” Coun Worth added. “And we don’t have much time.

“Once you start looking at getting different vehicles in you start thinking ‘is now the time to look at the way we collect?’

“We’ll have to make a decision quite quickly as we need to purchase new vehicles. Then we’ve got to get all systems running.

“Of course, every council in the country will be wanting to purchase new vehicles at the same time. You can imagine what that will be like.”

Currently, much of Lincolnshire’s black bag waste ends up being incinerated at North Hykeham to generate power for 30,000 homes, but recycling rates could be improved if food waste is diverted into anaerobic digestion, a report to Lincolnshire Waste Partnership states.

What do you think? Would you welcome wheelie bins? Let us know in the comments below or email news@lincsonline.co.uk with your views…