Calls for Brisbane City Council to bring back kerbside collection have reignited as the city reaches the one year milestone since the Lord Mayor cut the service.
The LNP leader paused the community garbage collection in early April 2020 and cut it from the budget completely a few months later.
Statistics show how big an impact the call to can the garbage collection has had on residents.
Figures from Council documents reveal that in the 10 months after kerbside collection was scraped, Brisbane City Council lodged more than 1,200 jobs to clean up illegal dumping.
Trips to the tip have jumped up too by 18.6% with more people hiring trailers or paying contractors to get their items to the tip.
And 6,040 residents have signed multiple petitions calling for kerbside collection to be reinstated.
Residents have taken to social media to air their frustrations.
“I received my rates notice. Who do I talk to about not paying it for the next 2 years? I see that you decided not to do kerbside pickup for the next two years to help your budget, so I’ve decided not to pay rates for the next two years to help my budget.” – one resident tweeted.
Council Opposition and Labor leader Jared Cassidy says the community is outraged and rightly so.
“This is a service every single resident pays for either directly through their rates or indirectly through their rent,”
“The LNP Lord Mayor claims he can’t afford $6.5 million a year to fund kerbside collection but can spend the same amount of money in a single year on advertising and promoting himself,”
“Kerbside collection should never have been cancelled and it should be brought back as a matter of urgency.”
Bring it back! I have so much junk that is another mans treasure to be collected!!
I need the kerbside collection because I am a pensioner, living by myself with no car and unable to dispose of unwanted items that someone else may deem usable.