THERE are no plans to introduce food waste recycling to Wirral households as the council 'simply' cannot afford it, it’s been revealed.

The local authority has announced that despite a willingness to introduce food waste collection service, the move would initially cost £3m extra plus around £1.8m per year from then on.

It also said 'misleading information' and rumours about the frequency of waste collections being reduced to three-weekly were untrue, and that there will be no changes to the current arrangements.

The news comes after an extensive consultation that took place last year.

Last week, the council said it would need financial assistance from the government if it was to meet the 50% national target for household waste recycling.

Cllr Phillip Brightmore, cabinet member for environment, said: “It is frustrating that the government and Wirral Council seem to share a desire to make it easier for residents to recycle more, and we even see eye-to-eye on some of the ways we can do that.

"However, unlike authorities in Wales, we have received no funding towards meeting national targets.

“We believe – as do some senior members of the government – that introducing a food waste collection service would enable the council to hit challenging recycling targets.

“However, in order to make the changes necessary to introduce this service, we would need to spend around £3 million as a capital investment and then spend around £1.8m per year to run the service on an ongoing basis.

“Yes, it would see a significant improvement for the local environment, with a lot less going into people’s non-recyclable waste bin, but with local authority finances in the situation they are in, it is simply unaffordable and unjustifiable out of our existing budget to take this forward.”

He said it was for that reason there were no plans to make changes to the way household waste is collected in Wirral, although efforts “continue to increase recycling in other ways”.

Cllr Brightmore added: “I keep reading misleading information being circulated that the council in Wirral is going to reduce the frequency of its household waste collections to three-weekly.

"That is completely and utterly incorrect.

“I am clear that residents must not be forced to accept fewer bin collections to achieve improved recycling rates – we will not allow that to happen.

"However, I am committed to finding new ways to make recycling easier for residents and improve current collection arrangements to offer more recycling opportunities, but any changes we propose must be affordable, effective and acceptable to our residents.”

He said the council now sends less than 10% of its waste to landfill, with the 'vast majority' now recycled or converted into green energy to power the national grid, adding: “This is good, but we must do more.”

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, which sets councils’ budgets, was contacted for comment.