MR PENDLE: £10 ‘bin tax’ leads to more thefts

It did not need a degree in rocket science to see what would happen once the new £10 “bin tax” introduced in Pendle Council’s last budget was implemented.

And within weeks of it coming into force, the inevitable came about.

Green boxes were blown away by high winds, wheelie bins were blown over and damaged and rather than pay the £10, people whose boxes and bins had been damaged stole other people’s.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Liberal Democrat councillors warned of this when voting against their introduction.

They could see what was coming.

So could Mr Pendle.

But the Conservative and Labour councillors either could not, or refused to - and now we can see who was right.

Mr Pendle has personally not been affected - his collection days have not coincided with any windy weather.

And he, like most other people in Pendle, works for a living so is not usually at home when his waste is collected, and his boxes and bins have therefore to wait until later in the day for them to be recovered from their collection point - leaving them an easy target for anyone needing a replacement.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The “bin tax” might have seemed like an easy way of raising extra revenue - but the costs of cleaning up the detritus left behind in the aftermath are likely to outweigh the sum raised.

IT has been far too easy for a philandering celebrity caught in embarrassing situations to run to the courts to seek an injunction against newspapers preventing them from publishing the lurid details - but not any more.

A committee chaired by the Master of the Rolls is recommending new laws are introduced as a matter of urgency - which means high profile figures will no longer be able to seek to keep something secret through the courts because it would be awkward for others to know what they had been up to.

Mr Pendle has no problem with people seeking injunctions on the grounds of unwarranted intrusion into their privacy - but where someone has been caught red-handed playing away from home or committing some other illicit matter of public interest, that is another story altogether.

WELL it didn’t take them long, did it?

The Premier League’s champion whingers, that’s who.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Barely a month into the football season and Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger are bleating about perceived injustices against their teams.

Sir Alex moaned after Manchester United had beaten Liverpool, claiming the Merseysiders’ two goals - a stonewall penalty and an even more obvious free kick - were gifted to them by a linesman.

And Wenger was upset Sunderland scored an equaliser in the fifth minute of stoppage time, when only four had been allocated - conveniently overlooking the fact Arsenal had benefited in similar circumstances in a game last season.

And to think we have another eight months of this to put up with ...