Wokingham Borough’s Liberal Democrat-led coalition administration is not telling the truth about scrapping green food waste bags, the Conservatives have argued.
The coalition claims that it is stopping green bags for financial reasons, despite money being allocated by the previous Conservative administration.
The scrapping of green bags now runs the risk that people will stop recycling their food waste, losing the Council up to £1million in savings.
The Council Leader, Clive Jones, had falsely told residents that the previous Conservative administration had not budgeted for the green food caddy liners.
However, in an email to the Leader of the Opposition, the Council’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) confirmed that money had been made available for the green bags in the Budget passed in February.
On top of this, the CFO explained that the cost of the bags was in fact £40k less than the administration claimed.
The Conservatives have now called for a review of the decision to scrap green bags, saying that residents have been misled about the reasons.
They add that the decision was not taken correctly at a public meeting, denying Opposition councillors the chance to properly scrutinise the claims being made.
Cllr Norman Jorgensen, Shadow Executive Member for Environment and Leisure, said:
“The Lib Dem-led coalition know that funding was made available for green bags, yet they’re telling people that they’re scrapping the bags because there’s no money.
“We’re concerned that this will dissuade people from recycling their food waste.
“At a meeting last year, which was attended by Lib Dem and Labour councillors, we were told that the food waste service is already saving us £500k per year and could save us a further £1 million a year if all food waste was diverted from the blue bags to the food waste service.
“Indeed, the Budget for this year has a saving of £350k built in from encouraging people to recycle food waste.
