Grim scenes of piled up and discarded rubbish in a Liverpool alley have ignited a lively debate.
Images were shared on the Wavertree Watch Facebook community group showing large piles of rubbish strewn around the alleyway between Colville Street and Dunstan Street in the south Liverpool suburb.
The pictures were posted by a local woman who sought to blame the council's waste teams for the state of the alley. She said: "The bin men have literally just been and this is how they have left the entry."
She added: "I went to put my bins out the other night and a rat was literally just chilling at the top of the bin, no wonder it's such a problem when its getting left in this state."
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The woman, who asked not to be named, told the ECHO: "I saw the bin men doing a very rushed job as I pulled up because there was a van waiting behind them. When I've gone into the entry to get my bin ten tonnes of rubbish were left outside my gate and the bins were left thrown everywhere."
But after posting the pictures in the Wavertree community group on Facebook, a debate kicked off about why the alley had been left in such a state and who was to blame.
A number of local residents leapt to the defence of the waste teams and said it is actually householders who are at fault for piling too much rubbish in and around the bins – along with items like a washing machine that cannot be collected by those teams.
Lex Peart said: "They won't pick up anything not in the bin. It's not their fault, blame the lazy neighbours. What is their fault is constantly not putting bins back in the alley and leaving them blocking pavements which are hard enough to navigate in a wheelchair or with a pram as it is."
Dominique Rose added: "Clearly not bin men's fault if it’s in the bin they take it and they also don’t take washing machines. Fault is with your neighbours."
Sharon Broadhurst agreed, she said: "That’s not the bin man’s fault, it’s the neighbour dumping. They are paid to empty bins not clean up after inconsiderate people who dump anything and everything in the entries.."
The original poster responded to say that most of the rubbish had been piled on top of "very full bins" the night before the waste teams came to the area. She added: "There are bins further up that haven't even been attempted to be emptied. Also All the rubbish outside my gate was definitely not there last night!"
Scott Johnson said: "They refused to empty my bin the other week. I complained and was told to complain to a different department."
A Liverpool City Council spokesperson said: “At this time of year, people produce much more waste than normal and our collection crews cannot always clear everything.
"Anything left will be picked up during the next collection round. After the festive period, we do put on additional resources to clear issues such as the ones shown in the photos. It is also important that residents present their bins in the appropriate location for collection, otherwise they will not be emptied.”
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