Unite union 'using city as national battlefield'

BIRMINGHAM Ladywood MP Shabana Mahmood has accused Unite’s national bosses of using the city as an ‘election battlefield’ over the bin strike as she urged pickets to stop ‘holding the city to ransom’

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Mahmood, the Government's Justice Secretary, has publicly intervened for the first time in the long-running strike, now in its seventh week.

In a hard-hitting letter to her constituents she says a major shake-up of the city’s ‘disastrous’ bins service is ‘long overdue’ with a high rate of missed collections and heaps of dumped rubbish on street corners blighting the inner city for years.

Transformation of the service is ‘critical’ to ensure residents enjoy reliable collections and clean streets, she says.