ONCE again Thurrock council has been forced to issue an apology for failures in its bins collection.

It's just a couple of weeks since the council 'reset' its waste collection service and a fresh start and a much improved service was promised.

But the reset got off to a difficult start as its first morning coincided with the scaling of the QEII bridge by two JustStopOil protesters. That caused huge traffic problems and a day long closure of roads around the council's lorry depot so crews found themselves behing the eight ball before the recovery programme cued off.

Problems have remained and residents across the whole of the borough have been complaining about missed collections - particularly of their brown garden waste bins.

The council has conceded it continues to have problems and says: "There have been issues with rounds, in part caused by how far behind collections got during the period of severe delays caused by the Just Stop Oil protest and the knock on effects from that.

"To help catch-up household waste collections focused on collecting recycling and general waste, with the previously announced resumption of brown bin collections being delayed by circumstances beyond the council's control.

"Brown bin collections had resumed at the start of last week and have initially started collecting those brown bins that were due for collection the earliest in the week, working up the scheduled collection days. From Wednesday, 9 November) we plan to collect waste on scheduled days, with additional collections being planned for Saturday to help catch-up.

"We are asking residents to take their brown bin out on their usual collection day and if they have not been collected to leave them out on Saturday.

"We would like to apologise to residents for the inconvenience caused and reassure them that every effort is being made to catch-up on all missed bins and resume regular, scheduled two weekly collections of brown bin garden waste."

Earlier this month private, locally-based companies began to advertise for new staff for Thurrock collection rounds, sparking speculation that the council was seeking to contract more services out. Thurrock Nub News asked if this was the case but no response on that issue has been received.