THE borough councillor at the helm of the authority's environmental service says it will still take time to catch up with the impact of the recent strike, but he is confident it won't be long before all collections are back up to date.

Cllr Andrew Jefferies has taken on the portfolio for environment and one of his first tasks has been to thank residents for patience shown as Thurrock Council bids to catch up following the end of the strike.

With the bin teams having just completed a first week or returning to work here will be no changes to the schedule as a result of the bank holiday, with collections taking place on Monday 31 May as normal, though the council says it is still not possible to collect all bins on their normal day as crews deal with extra waste which has built up over the last few weeks.

Cllr Jefferies said: "I would like to thank residents for bearing with us as our crews work hard to get bin collections fully back to their normal schedule. We expect to be completely up to date and back on track from Monday 7 June onwards.

"Please put your blue and green or grey bin out for collection on the usual day and our crews will collect it as soon as they can."

Household collections are expected to return to normal from Monday, 7 June when collections of brown bins every two weeks will also resume.

Until then residents are advised to put their blue and green or grey bin out for collection on the normal day and leave them out until waste has been taken.

Side waste will be collected if it is tied securely in bags and left next to bins.

Side waste will only be accepted for recycling if it is tied in clear blue bags you can collect from the locations found at thurrock.gov.uk/bins-notice. Any waste collected in black bags will not be recycled.

The temporary waste drop-off sites created by the council during the strike are now closed.