A CITY councillor is pushing for answers over rubbish that has piled up in streets since heavy snow hit two weeks ago.

Bin collectors couldn’t get to several streets around the city when the “Beast from the East” hit. Now Clifton councillor Danny Myers is asking for answers on what happens when rubbish isn’t collected on schedule.

The Labour councillor said he asked about missing bin collections back in October, to be told staff would go back to collect waste “as soon as possible”, but only if a whole street had been missed. Now he has been told streets with wheelie bins will actually have to wait another fortnight - making it a month between collections.

Cllr Myers added: “It’s quite understandable that residents are up in arms about not receiving waste collections, particularly as it’s one of very few frontline services everyone expects to receive”.

The councillor praised frontline staff for doing a “great job” in poor weather, but said the issue of “catch-up” collections is not clear enough. Council bosses need to be honest about what residents can expect, he said.

Cllr Myers added: “It may be that there is simply insufficient capacity and money in the system to deliver this important frontline service when bad weather arrives. But if this is the case, residents need to know the council’s policy so they can plan for it..”

A council spokesman has said the “caach-up” policy hasn’t changed, but assistant director for environment, but that in very bad weather next day collections might not be possible.

Assistant director for environment James Gilchrist said homes with black bin bags had to be a priority for catch-up collections - to stop rubbish spilling out on the the streets.

He said: “I would like to thank residents for bearing with us. The weather obviously presented a real challenge, and is one of those occasions where we are unable to collect missed bins the following day.

He said they will have extra crews at work for the rest of the week, to collect extra waste on people’s normal collection days.

“The crew, vehicles and timings may be different to your usual collection, so please put your waste out before 7am to make sure we collect it.”