A disabled woman from Littleport believes she is in an ‘outrageous situation’ after having to deal with failures of her assisted bin collections for nearly a year.

The woman has been placing her rubbish outside her house ready for it to be collected as an assisted collection each week, but says every time without fail it’s been left.

“I’ve contacted the council every week and have raised several complaints but I keep being told that they’re ‘short staffed’, that the agency staff ‘haven’t turned up’ and the appliance vehicle is ‘old and broken down,” she said.

“I’ve been promised and assured on several occasions that I will not be missed again and then the following week my recycling just sits outside my house because no one comes to pick it up.

"I believe it's discrimination against people dealing with a disability."

The woman is not the only individual on the street struggling with assisted refuse collections though – two of her elderly neighbours are also in the exact same situation.

She has been in contact with MP Steve Barclay’s office regarding the issue, but to no avail.

%image(15912784, type="article-full", alt="The woman from Littleport believes the situation she is in is a "discrimination against people dealing with a disability".")

“I’ve even suggested about those with assisted collections having a disability sticker on the wheelie bins to highlight and indicate our predicament to the bin men at a glance,” she said.

“We have these collections in place because we are not able to carry our rubbish very far at all, but I believe residents have been instructed in the past to carry refuse to a central collection site further up the road (we live down a side road).

“We can’t move mounds of bags on route for their convenience, so our refuse is just being left outside every day to rot.”

She added: “I’m even aware now that there’s a Facebook page where residents communicate to see whether their refuse has been collected!"

When contacting East Cambridgeshire District Council about this issue, head of East Cambs Street Scene, James Khan, said: “East Cambs Street Scene takes all assisted bin collections very seriously and works hard to ensure it is able to offer this free service to any resident who requires it.”

%image(15912785, type="article-full", alt="The woman from Littleport believes the situation she is in is a "discrimination against people dealing with a disability".")

“While we have had recent issues with some of our bin collections, we are working extremely hard to resolve these as quickly as possible and would like to apologise to any residents who have been adversely affected by these changes.

“We are working to ensure all residents are able to return to the gold standard service as quickly as possible.”