Powys residents are leaving their bins out all day every day as they don’t know when their rubbish and recycling will be collected anymore, a meeting has heard.

A meeting of Powys County Council on 9 July discussed a motion to review the new recycling and waste collection following the shambolic roll out of new collection routes from March which has seen rubbish and recycling left uncollected for days on end, causing anger amongst residents.

The motion had been put forward by Cllr Gwynfor Thomas and seconded by Cllr Graham Breeze.

Cllr Breeze said that the problems were: “risking recycling participation at a time we need it most.”

He added that problems had continued into the last week.

Portfolio holder for waste and recycling Cllr Richard Church who inherited the problems following a cabinet reshuffle in May said: “There’s a great deal in what is being said that I agree with, but this motion has largely been overtaken by events.”

He explained that a report following a review by WRAP Cymru had already been written and would be discussed by councillors at a joint scrutiny meeting next week.

Cllr Church: “This report has been on the way for some considerable time, it was requested by my predecessor Cllr Jackie Charlton.

“The number of missed collections is falling, it fell to 0.24 per cent in June and in the first week of July it was down to 0.17 per cent.”

“Whether this motion is carried or not doesn’t make much difference because what it calls for is already in train.”

Cllr Lucy Roberts asked for clarity around the missed collection figures.

Cllr Roberts said: “A lot of residents don’t bother to report their missed collections as they are so fed up with it.”

Senior waste and recycling manager Ashley Collins said this was based on reported missed collections.

“If people don’t report missed collections it’s very difficult for us to measure that,” said Mr Collins.

Cllr Roberts stressed : “We need to be cautious of those figures.”

Cllr Church said that the estimate of “missed but not reported collections” is five per cent of Powys households.

Conservative group leader Cllr Aled Davies said: “When you look at the stats it looks as though there is no problem.

“The drivers should know how many missed collections there were, you should not be relying on reported missed collections.

“People are leaving their bins out 24/7 now, because they simply don’t know when the next collection will be.”

He stressed that the new collection routes were a “planned change” and should have a “high level of certainty that the plan was deliverable” before it was rolled out.

Cllr Ed Jones said: “My ward has suffered from this massively.

“I don’t want excuses and reports, I just want the service fixed, it’s not hard.

“If there are missed collections, surely the staff know where they are.”

At the end of the debate, Cllr Thomas said: “We need action, people are getting fed up of this.”