A MAJOR overhaul of York's street-cleaning service has been given the green light by city chiefs.

City of York Council's executive has approved plans to reorganise the service, and introduce new ventures to tackle problem areas in terraced streets.

The scheme will see five zones set up around the city, each with a dedicated team patrolling residential areas with wheelbarrows and brushes, in rebranded vans and uniforms.

The back-to-basics scheme will be piloted next month, before being brought in across the city from next spring.

As reported in The Press last week, the changes will see a reorganisation and renaming of the £3.2 million Street Scene service to focus on residential areas and press for prosecution of fly-tippers.

Each of the five teams will have a champion, who will be responsible for keeping up standards in the area.

A report to the executive said approving the scheme would "improve the actual and perceived condition and appearance of the city's streets, housing estates and publicly accessible services".

Andrew Waller, the council's executive member for neighbourhood services, welcomed the new programme.

He said: "We have improved standards of street cleanliness over the last three years through York Pride, which reversed Labour's cuts to the service. However, if we are to continue making improvements, we need to take the best practice from within York, and from similar councils.

"The pilot will show the benefit of a highly-visible, thorough approach to keeping the streets tidy.

"Each area will have a champion who will not only be the named contact, but will be able to move council resources to problem areas."

The structure is modelled on the current system in the city centre and has received cross-party support.

Labour's Ruth Potter, shadow executive member for neighbourhood services, said: "This is to be warmly welcomed because it is exactly the sort of thing that we have been saying York has needed for years.

"Street cleaning services in York are simply not good enough, with some people receiving a massively inferior service to others despite paying the same levels of council tax.

"People deserve to know why it has taken so long to be addressed."

Terry Collins, the council's director of Neighbourhood Services, said the aim was to encourage people to report litter problem areas, by ensuring complaints were dealt with quickly.

He said: "It is no good if people ring up and have to wait three days for us to respond. We want to be quick off the mark."