A top Tory politician has hit out after bins in his neighbourhood went un-emptied during the festive season.

Some households on Tuesday collection routes in Keighley didn’t have their waste collected for three weeks because of how Christmas Day and New Year’s Day fell, said Worth Valley councillor Glen Miller.

He accused Bradford Council of not having any plan in place to deal with the missed collections.

“While this would be less than ideal at any time, the festive season is more problematic as most households have much more waste to dispose of,” said Shann Park resident Coun Miller, the Council’s Conservative group leader.

“I would like to apologise to those affected if the council’s absence of strategic thinking on the matter made your neighbourhoods into candidates for twinning with shanty towns.”

But the council refutes the allegation it had no plan in place.

It said refuse collections due on December 25 were instead made a few days earlier, on December 22. Those due on December 26 were made on December 29, and bins scheduled for emptying on January 1 were collected on Saturday.

It added households affected by the changes were notified via a tag attached to the handle of each bin left out for collection in the week running up to Christmas. Details were also posted on the council website.

Coun Andrew Thornton, executive member for environment, sport and sustainability, said: “The Christmas and New Year refuse collection is an issue which we consider carefully each year.

“Arrangements vary from year to year, depending on which day of the week the holidays fall. As the Christmas Day and New Year’s Day bank holidays always fall on the same day of consecutive weeks, we go to a lot of trouble to plan and advertise any changes to collection days because we recognise the importance of this service.”

He added: “This year, approximately half of the households in the district were affected by the changes and only a small number of complaints have been received.”

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