Police urged to get tough and stop bin strike pickets 'holding city to ransom'

WEST Midlands Police officers are being urged to act against striking pickets so bin trucks can reach the 17,000 tonnes of rubbish now piling up on the city's streets.

- JANE HAYNES Politics & People Editor

MPs and councillors are pressing for action amid frustration that pickets are being allowed to disrupt waste lorries day after day by 'walking slowly' in front of them, at considerable potential risk. The result has been a massive escalation in rubbish around the city.

A backlog of a 17,000 tonnes of waste is now clogging up pavements and causing an unhealthy stench, with rats and maggots running riot.

The all-out strike is now in its fourth week, with no end in sight.

Edgbaston MP Preet Kaur Gill led calls for urgent action to stop a small number of workers 'holding the city to ransom' a message backed by the Government's Communities Secretary Jim McMahon.

Speaking in the House of Common, she said: "The Birmingham bin strike has meant many of my constituents haven't had their bins collected in weeks, and this week my constituent wrote to me to say they had been bitten by a rat.

"It is unacceptable that Unite pickets have been frustrating the council's contingency plans by blocking their depots."