Food waste service faces £1.5m shortfall

HOUSEHOLDS in rural parts of Northumberland are set to miss out on the council's new kerbside food recycling service.

- JAMES ROBINSON Local democracy reporter [e-mail]

Instead, only houses in the urban south east as well as towns in the centre of the county, including Morpeth and Ponteland, will benefit.

Leading councillors have blamed a shortfall in the level of funding provided by central Government for a food waste service, which will become a statutory service from April 2026. At Tuesday's meeting of the council's cabinet, members heard the council was around £1.5 million short of the amount needed to rollout the service county-wide.

Speaking at the meeting, council leader Glen Sanderson said: "Recently the new Government have taken this up, but sadly we don't have sufficient money to make this work across the whole of the county.