Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Talk from the Tip

You will all have Tip stories, I'm sure. Ours is often run by stormtroopers. But if I send MrsW, nothing is too much trouble.

Anyway, I put the Tip trip off forever, because I pay enough council tax, so I use my own bin. Oh but the garden bin is a paid service, which this summer has been suspended due to staff shortages. Here's an idea. Send a Council Press Gang down to the dole office. I digress.

So I had 2x 5L cans of old oil, a battery, and some bagged rubbish released from my loft clearout.

He tells me I'm only allowed one 5L can of oil every six months, but it's OK for two today. I mean, the Roadster takes over 5L. SiLs W12 takes 12.5L.

This is crazy council rule making, and how can they police 'six months'? It should be obvious who is a paid mechanic, and I don't fit that profile. Even my fingernails are pristine for once. Perhaps they should inspect fingernails. Where does the council imagine those with high volumes of old oil will dispose of it? Crazy as Milliband, when asked whether high taxation of energy suppliers caused costs to increased, blamed internationally set prices and could not accept taxation is involved at all. And he got very shouty and nasal about being right. Another digress.

My waste oil goes in a 22 litre heavy plastic container, left over from my boating days to carry spare diesel. When it needs emptying it gets taken down the tip (now pre-book only) and poured by myself into their humungous tank, no questions asked so far. Not sure how this is recycled if at all, but knowing what goes into it good luck to anyone who tries.

Can we have a Scottish version of this - "Craik from the Cowp"?

Note quite the council tip, but a skip tale...

The last sizeable building co I worked for had a really big traditional 'yard', full of commercial plant, site cabins awaiting refurb and literally 100's of tonnes of stuff and a big tower crane for moving stuff about & loading waggons

One day I'm up 't yard, looking for something for a site, when the yard gaffa shouts a few expletives and I notice a big pile of old wheelbarrows next to the steel scrap skip I'm near to, I hear the whirring of steel cables and a massive crash as the crane drops a huge cube of concrete onto the barrows and I disappear in a cloud of dust just inches away, the labourer appears and starts throwing the squished metal in the skip with a "saves space in't skip mate"

Well I have a positive story from Somerset this week. I took 60 + old bricks + gone hard lime mortar to the dump. Sorry I’m not PC …….. couldn’t work out how to book it in or how many bags it was or equated to. Bricks stack neatly in the boot but not in builders bags .
The ‘refuse recycling operative’, a ruddy faced jovial chap, took a door from the car without being asked, helped us go on line to book from his hut, said with a wink that it was only 4 bags full (!) which allowed us to have another 4 before the months end ! I thought that was veryl decent of him and my boot will include a 4 or 6 pack of beer for him when I go again this week.l
Too many restrictions make people fly tip…..oil poured down drains etc.
Best MM

I must admit I have been confused by the move from Basingrad/Hampshire to Dartmouth.

Collections (not easy due to roads, seagulls and tourists with bags of dog poo)
Black bags of mixed kitchen waste
Basingrad - Weekly in bin
Dartmouth - 2 weeks, in Seagull sack (no seal on the bag so an interesting odour as it must be indoors if you don't have a garden)

Separated Green Waste (plastic, paper etc)
Basingrad - Every two weeks in large green bin and smaller trough
Dartmouth - Every week in two smaller plastic troughs, little capacity if you do Amazon.

If I have excess (or smelly) kitchen waste I phone the council and have a allowance of 6 black bags _per year_ which I can then take to the dump myself. I can take as much recycling/garden and other waste but not kitchen waste. Collected every two weeks. Which is smelly. Hmmmmm. I wonder if that happens to align to a nominal re-cycling target of some sort or a real goal for the council or contractor?

Dartmouth has a permanent population of 5-6000 up to 10-12,000 when AirBnB kicks off in July. Despite this there is one bottle recycling location at the park and ride and little else anywhere for any overflow. So I have to drive for 25 minutes to Torcross tip. Jolly eco at a planet level eh?

If they had weekly kitchen collections the limited number of sacks and additional trouble of making calls might be more acceptable. I will be raising it with a local politician when I can find one. We had a farce last week. The local election took place and the local candidate who had applied won it. He then announced that he would not be taking up the appointment as he did not feel it was right. You can't make this stuff up.

Clipped from Fishbook as it is a private group for residents.
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Dartmouth News & support Sharing UK (Residents only grp)
Adrian Booker

I have to tell you that I refused to take my seat on Dartmouth Town Council. I have no doubt that the fault will visibly lie on my side, and I will be discredited.
I hadn’t at all expected to fight an election, and I’ve never done it before. All the canvassing I was doing was, well, not exactly a sham, but it was an act. It’s not me at all. I was being subjected to abuse from day one of that campaign.
It won me the election easily, although of course I was the only Dartmouth resident who had the courage to stand. When I say courage, I mean it. I’m a shy sort of person, socially awkward, can’t wear suits, hate mobile phones. None of these disadvantages are filtered out in the selection process.
When I went to the Guildhall to enrol, I had several proposals. I wanted the council to apply for permit parking outside the Guildhall to make it easier for councillors to park. I wanted improvements to the prison-like hatchway in the foyer which is the interface between the council and the people. It immediately became obvious that the council would consider neither of these proposals.
What really destroyed me was that I was told I could only enter the office by telephone appointment. I never wanted to be a councillor really. This was just a way to get a bit closer to the administration, so I could do something about the allotments. Although far from being my only interest, the allotments are a big issue for me.
Therefore, my political career lasted about two minutes.
In my defence, I was the only Dartmouth resident who had the courage to stand in either ward. The campaign cost me £180 out of my own money, and I have been severely traumatised from day one. It’s been a bad month.
There will be another election, which will cost the town £2000. That’s all the council was interested in. They weren’t at all interested that it cost me £180, and that I was traumatised.
In the light of this tale, I would advise caution to any other would-be candidates in the next election.
I never, ever, want any contact with anything like this again! Ever!
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I am lost for words. I am not standing, I have disappointed enough people in my life (parents, various girlfriends, bosses etc) so don't need that in my life!

Last year I took about 6 litres of old engine oil to the local tip in various 1 litre and 2 litre plastic bottles. One of which was labelled gear oil.

“Sorry but we only take engine oil here” were the words of wisdom delivered by the young oik attending to me.

By opening the lids to demonstrate they all contained the same colour liquid, I eventually convinced him it actually was engine oil.

Next time I shall use 2 litre plastic milk bottles. Just for fun.

What a world we live in.

Looks like he needs to spend more time down at the allotment...ALONE