WASTE complaints during Edinburgh’s festival season dropped by almost a third from the previous year, according to the latest figures.
Calls made to City of Edinburgh Council on street cleaning, fly-tipping, dog fouling and communal bins during August decreased by 32 per cent from the same period in 2016.
Additional resources were put in place throughout the month to help deal with festivals’ impact, such as 40 extra staff joining the existing 90 to provide 24-7 support.
Councillor Lesley Macinnes, transport and environment convener, said: “These are encouraging figures, they demonstrate the impact our efforts to improve waste and cleansing services are having, not just in the centre but across the city.
“By increasing resources around the busy festival period we have been able to cope better with demand, but we want to continue to target issues like litter and fly-tipping throughout the year.
“While we are working on actions to achieve this, we also need the help of the public.
“I would encourage people to take responsibility for their rubbish and help make Edinburgh a clean, welcoming place, whatever the season.”
In the city centre, which sees a sharp rise in visitors over the 2017 festival period, complaints were halved — falling by 53 per cent.
The local authority had also put in place frequent litter bin collections and increased patrols by environmental wardens to discourage litter-dropping and fly-tipping. A 65-point Waste and Cleansing Improvement Plan was approved by the council’s Transport and Environment Committee in November 2016.
It was designed to address poor performance in the waste collection and street cleansing services by focusing on aspects such as waste collection routing, workforce training and communal bin provision.
The move was prompted by a rise in complaints and declining customer satisfaction in the services provided to the public.
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here