Put your black bags in a wheelie bin you bought yourself and Carmarthenshire‘s crews will walk past it.
That is one line in a 31-page rulebook going to Carmarthenshire Council‘s cabinet on Monday, written to sit under the switch from blue bags to colour-coded sacks that reaches a third of the county this autumn. Most of it is the small print residents have never seen written down, and some of it is new.
The bin on your drive
Crews will not empty privately bought wheelie bins “on health and safety grounds”, the policy says, because the council cannot vouch for a bin it did not buy against the hoist on its lorries. Bags can be stored in one, but on the day they must be lifted out and put at the kerb. A full bin left out gets a sticker and a note on the property’s record.
A standard 80 to 90 litre dustbin is fine, bags inside, tied.
Black bags stay at three every three weeks, but the policy now fixes the size: 60 litres, black only, provided by you. Oversized bin-liner bags, very heavy bags, bags in any other colour and anything left beside them will be left behind.
Holiday lets lose their collection
Anyone renting out all or part of their home, from a full Airbnb to a granny flat let in summer, gets no household collection “irrespective of whether they pay council tax (including those who pay premium rates)”. They must pay a contractor, or pay the council to arrange one. Homes lived in only for part of the year are treated as businesses too. Second homes that are never let, and pay council tax, keep their collection.
The ladder
The policy sets out what happens after a sticker, which is more than most residents assume. First a letter. Then a visit from a waste warden or a recycling adviser. After that, “section 46 notices, fixed penalty notices or a court appearance”.
The council says enforcement is only for households “that have received prior education and guidance, which has then not been adhered to”. Wrong day, wrong bag, contaminated recycling, glass in a carrier bag and bags put out so early they spill all count as infringements.
Ordering too many bags gets you a visit
Homes on the new sacks get one delivery. After that there are limits: one replacement red, blue or orange sack a year, six rolls of food-caddy liners, two glass boxes. Order above the line and “residents may be contacted or visited by a Recycling Advisor”. Households of six or more, or with medical needs, can have the limits lifted after a home visit, and get a pink sticker for one extra black bag.
Solid-fuel fires get unlimited bags for ash, stickered, reviewed every two years.
Missed your bin? The lorry has a camera
A missed collection can be reported from 2pm on the day until 4pm the next working day, with crews aiming to return within two. Repeat reports will be checked against the lorry’s tracking and onboard cameras, and if the vehicle passed with nothing at the kerb, “this will not be deemed a missed collection”.
The same cameras decide who pays when a garden waste bin is broken: crew’s fault, free replacement; yours, buy another.
At the tip
Black bags at Trostre, Nantycaws, Wernddu and Whitland go to a sorting station first, where you separate the recyclables yourself; staff “can provide guidance and equipment” but will not do it. Leaving unsorted bags at the gate is fly-tipping under the Environmental Protection Act. One fridge per visit, three bags of plasterboard a month, five litres of garden chemicals.
Families clearing a home after a death or a move into care can get three days’ access on application.
Why now
The rulebook is the paperwork behind the sack switch, which the council says starts mid-to-late autumn in the west of the county with the rest to follow. The report to cabinet says the new model “is expected to deliver significant savings” and protects the money the council gets from packaging producers, and that Carmarthenshire is “one of the last remaining councils in Wales” still on mixed blue bags.
Swansea went the other way this month, telling residents its crews would start checking black bags for bottles and cans.
Cabinet meets at County Hall at 10am on Monday, with the policy presented by transport and waste cabinet member Cllr Edward Thomas. It has not been to scrutiny first.
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