Hillingdon council to remove 700 dog-waste bins, angering west London residents

Hillingdon council, a Conservative-run authority in west London, is removing 700 dog-waste bins to save money, a decision that has angered residents who fear the borough will be covered in dog poo.

The council believes the move will save £100,000 in waste collection costs and hopes dog owners will use general litter bins instead. A council report setting out the plan said it would save £160,000, of which £60,000 would be reinvested in street cleaning. Hillingdon's pet dogs produce about 174 tonnes of faeces each year, which until now has generally been bagged by owners and dropped into dog-waste bins.

"There'll be nowhere else to put the bags of it"

Daniel O'Neill, chief road steward at Ruislip Residents' Association, said people were worried. "People are worried there's going to be dog shit everywhere," he said. He predicted bags would pile up in front gardens, describing a "Christmas tree of dog-shit baubles", and said he had used an AI generator to create an image of a Christmas tree hung with bags of dog waste in different colours to show what he expected to happen.

Sital Punja, an opposition Labour councillor who walks her springer-poodle Marley daily in Ruislip woods, said the removals had dominated chat between dog walkers. "People are really unhappy about it, it's going to be dumped everywhere," she said. The dog bins in the woods are already overflowing and there are not enough general bins, she added. Dog bins have lids that keep smells inside, while general bins do not, meaning they "stink and can be got at by foxes".

Council finances under pressure

Hillingdon is not the first council to remove dog-waste bins to try to save money. Similar plans have prompted outrage in Cornwall, Kent, North Somerset and elsewhere.

The borough's large debts are increasing by £5.6m a year. Its schools grant deficit alone is £101.5m, and the government has "serious concerns" about Hillingdon's finances, which could jeopardise its chances of continuing to rely on exceptional financial support grants from Whitehall. At the same time, the council prides itself on having frozen council tax for years.

O'Neill said that was the root of the problem. He said raising council tax even to the average in London would bring in £26m, whereas the council was instead "not emptying the dog-shit bins to save £100,000". He added that telling residents about the deficit or audit problems drew little interest, but that bin removals made them "go nuts".

Comments on Ruislip's residents' association Facebook page appeared to bear this out. "What an absurd suggestion," one person wrote. Another called it "madness" and asked: "Are they trying to completely alienate the residents?" One resident said there were already not enough bins and described the plan as "shortsighted".

Wayne Bridges, the council's cabinet member for residents' services, said the council understood some residents had concerns. He said it was "simply changing how it is collected", making better use of the nearly 1,500 ordinary litter bins already available across Hillingdon. He said allowing dog waste in ordinary public litter bins, which can already be used safely for that purpose, would more than double capacity and remove the cost of running two separate services, adding that many councils already allow dog waste to be disposed of through general waste arrangements.

Source: The Guardian.