Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council has called an urgent meeting with Hampshire County Council and West Berkshire Council in a bid to find possible solutions to a ‘cross border waste war’.
Borough residents living near to the West Berkshire border may soon be ‘banned’ from taking their waste to Newbury’s Newtown recycling centre or Padworth recycling centre following the removal of the county council’s £200,000 funding that helped to pay for the recycling facilities.
The borough council is keen to find a suitable solution so that residents don’t have to travel up to 50 miles across the borough to the Wade Road facility instead of using one close by, but over a county boundary. This will be the focus of a discussion between council heads at the end of this month.
The borough council’s Cabinet Member for Regulatory Services and the Environment Cllr Hayley Eachus said: “While these recycling centres aren’t the responsibility of the borough council, we are concerned that some of our residents may be forced to travel far longer distances than others to dispose of their waste and recycle items that aren’t collected at the kerbside.
“We must concentrate on working together to make things easier for residents rather than focusing on bureaucratic local government borders.
“Everyone accepts that councils are under financial pressure and these situations are never as simple as they seem. But we need to adopt a common sense approach and ensure council tax payers’ interests come first. With goodwill on all sides and a bit of creativity, we hope we can find a sensible solution."
