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[Press Release: July 29th, 2004] Greens concerned about introduction of Pay -Per-Use charges for waste collectionThe Green Party has expressed its concern at the announcement by the Greenstar waste management company that it will be introducing a Pay-Per-Use system for waste collection in Wicklow from January 1st 2005, in order to comply with a Government Regulation.Green Party councillor, Deirdre de Burca, claims that many waste companies, including Greenstar, are not in a position to properly comply with the Government Regulation as they do not have the weighing equipment in place to offer a proper "Pay-Per-Weight" system. "The idea behind a Pay- Per- Weight or Pay- Per- Volume system is that it provides an incentive to people to reduce the amount of waste that they are leaving out for collection" says Green Party councillor, Deirdre de Burca. "However, it is unclear how Greenstar are going to implement such a system effectively without having proper weighing equipment on their lorries which collect domestic waste". According to Green Party councillor, Caroline Burrell, Greenstar will charge a fee of 392 euros next year as an annual charge for a wheelie bin service, including a green bin. It will monitor the amount of weight left out by households over the first six months of next year and will categorize households into four bands depending on how much waste is left out for collection. Those households in the lowest bands will receive a rebate while households in the highest bands may have to pay more than the proposed 392 euros. "Households will end up paying anything between 264 and 524 euros, depending on how much waste they leave out for collection" she says. Green Party councillor Ciaran O'Brien has expressed his colleague's frustration with the fact that charges for waste collection are no longer under democratic control. "It seems to me that we have what is effectively a private monopoly in waste collection in Bray" he says. "At the same time, we do not have a doorstep recycling service for every home in Bray and we have no recycling centre, as they have in Wicklow Town and in Arklow. This compares poorly to our neighbouring local authority, Dunlaoghaire Rathdown, where waste collection charges are much lower, most houses have a green bin service for recycling and there is a state-of-the-art public recycling centre at Ballyogan". The Green Party has called on Greenstar to make its smaller wheelie bin service available to all householders and to collect Tetra Paks as part of the green bin service. The Green Party councillors on Bray Town Council intend putting a series of questions to Greenstar representatives when they make a presentation to the council at their first meeting in December.
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