Bulwell: Free bulky waste collection to return to Nottingham city

Nottingham City Council said residents will be able to have their larger household items picked up from their homes for no charge from this September.

It is a service which currently costs up to £26 for six items.

Coun Corall Jenkins (Lab), who is in charge of the city’s neighbourhoods, waste and equalities departments, said that the council had ‘listened to what people had been saying’ with regards to the decision to reintroduce the perk.

She continued: “It’s part of the investment into frontline services,.

"We listened to what people have been saying about cleaner, greener streets and we also want to try and combat fly-tipping by removing the barriers to cost and really making an effort to get people to dispose of bulky waste properly.

“It’s what people have been calling for.

"Locally, as a Labour council, we want to give people what they’re asking for.

"They’ve asked for it and we want to deliver it and this is our way of trying to do that.

“When we’re door-knocking, people have told us they want it.

"We go right across the wards and it’s been something that residents themselves have said to us on their doorsteps, at councillor surgeries and through contacting the council.”

The announcement on bulky waste collection coincides with a new programme of cleaning services across Nottingham, details of which are due to be announced over the summer.

The council stripped street cleaning down to its bare bones in late 2023 after it declared effective bankruptcy.

Residential sweeping was cut from once every 10 days to just four times per year.

But the authority has turned its finances around in the last two years, with Bulwell councillor and deputy leader Ethan Radford (Lab) telling the Local Democracy Reporting Service in November that work to get the ‘house in order’ had ‘paid off’.

Bulky waste covers items that don’t fit in the bin, such as white goods like fridges, freezers and washing machines, sofas, chairs and other wooden furniture like tables and wardrobes, and televisions.

Former council leader, Coun David Mellen said: “I think it shows that the change to a Labour Government has made a difference in Nottingham.

"We sadly had to make the choice to charge people for this service and it’s no doubt that it has discouraged people from having their big items collected.

“If they have it for free, we think people will take that up rather than dumping things on the street.

"But it’s not going to be a failsafe, because when we did have it free before, there was still fly-tipping.”

Coun Jenkins confirmed that enforcement will remain to punish fly-tippers but added she hoped the new collections would reduce incidents.

She said: “I’m hoping it goes a long way to addressing some of those concerns of fly-tipping.

"I’m hoping people will respect the fact that, as a council, we are seeking to keep our city clean and greener.

“However, where we have persistent fly-tippers, we will be dealing with those who don’t want to use the system and think it’s okay to dump rubbish and we will seek to use enforcement to manage that.”