Blame cast on students for rubbish in the streets over Christmas period

STUDENTS have been blamed for large numbers of rubbish bags left in the streets, as well as fly tipping through Brynmill and Uplands.

The claims, which were brought by a resident of Bryn Road, highlight problems faced at the end of term by students leaving rubbish out of sync with bin collection days.

But students were quick to hit back, with the Swansea University students’ union defending efforts of students in streets cleans and community relations.

Charlotte Britton, SU welfare officer, said: “We’ve been on a large number of street cleans with students and non-student residents over the last few months.

“The council are trying to help us, and they’ve been lax with fining to give us enough time to educate students about the new system.”

Students have claimed the problems come from the lack of extra bin collections when Swansea Council is aware they will be leaving before the bin collection days.

Extra collection dates were set at the end of the summer term in 2011, but there were complaints of poor advertising and little progress to have the same implemented this year.

Extra dates are being worked on for the Easter and summer terms.

Miss Britton was also keen to be positive about the progress students have made.

She said: “We have made dramatic improvements in recycling. 

“The rates of incorrect recycling have dropped thanks to SU and council booklets being distributed through HMOs (houses with multiple occupants) properties.”

Miss Britton was keen to emphasise the the system is relatively new, with the changes being implemented in April of 2011.

Miss Britton added: “From 20th of October onwards there has been a significant reduction in bags left on the street, not to mention that between April and June 2011, 48 per cent of all municipal waste was either sent for composting or recycling.”

The new kerbside scheme means that black bin bags are collected every other week, with pink bags, and green bags are collected with food waste on the weeks in between.

Extra recycling bags can be collected from the Students’ Union, along with 2012 calendars for collection days, magnets and plenty of information about the recycling scheme in Swansea.