Time for the private sector to take over and a piece work style of pay.

Seriously? Am I the only person who struggled to get his car out to a main road without an issue today, and that doesn't really want some idiot driving one of those big trucks and turning it round near his house?

....and seriously, in the times when they collected your bin for you, the council had to provide twice as many trucks and each one had double the amount of people on it so surely that was costing more in taxes??

I don't remember Warrington being minus 10 degrees when I was a kid, if they want to be cautious and not kill anyone or hit any cars over Christmas then I'm fine with it!

It won`t be the choice of the crews not to collect, potentially they will lose out on a lot of xmas tips if their not out and about.

It would incentivise re-cycling as well (although the increase in fly-tipping may be a problem)

We havn`t had winters like this one for a long time, how do you know they have coped in past years when we have had snow and ice ?

Do you have access to the amount of claims that the public have put in due to accidents in the ice and snow in years gone by ? One tap from an out of control, sliding bin lorry is going to do a lot of damge to a car or even a property if its at the bottom of a slope.

It could be that the council have learnt from the past where the adverse conditions in years gone by lead to a lot of accidents involving their vehicles where their insurance companies had to pay out a lot of money hence putting up the councils premiums.

Insurance companies will have a big say in the transport industry as to whether a company wants to risk running its fleet, they may not even pay out if they get proof that the conditions wern`t safe for a vehicle of that size to be operating, their are a lot of clauses in insurance policies especially with HGV`s due to the amount of damage they can cause and the potential payouts for insurance companies. The councils public liabilty insurance will be expensive and tightly worded as well, their are a lot of factors involved before companies decide to shutdown a transport operation of any kind.

We've had plenty of winters in my lifetime just as bad/worse. FACT. Bin lorries went out then. We are now overrun with bureaucrats with clipboards, desperately trying to justify their existance.
EVERYTHING has a risk to it. We can't go through life cushioned in cotton wool.
This country just seems to down tools at the first oportunity. GET ON WITH IT
In the majority of Warrington areas, we got 3 to 4 inches of snow on Friday night, with no considerable snow fall since, and 4 days later, we still can't cope. Something's not right.

And this country loves a good moan, we have a right moaning, whinging culture in the UK. Any excuse for a good moan and some people are rubbing their hands with glee whilst wearing a big wide smile.

Just get on with it, the bin lorries aint running and thats that. It was obviously a safety decision, the backlash would have been unthinkable if an out of control bin lorry knocked down a kid playing in the streets with fatal consequences.

Not whinging. Just stating that they should be out doing their jobs, like me, and countless millions others have to.
Take a look outside on the road tonight when you go home. There will be loads of HGVs out there. YOU DRIVE THE VEHICLE TO HOW THE CONDITIONS DICTATE. Bin lorries have gone out in compacted snow/ice before.

Quite apt, Rob Wire, that your avatar, is that of a bone idle copper, who doesn't want to do any work!

Which point are you failing to grasp, your above comment is comical. The HGV`s your referring too don`t operate in residential side streets due to weight limits of which the weight limits are their for a reason, most of the main trunk and A roads are clear, its the side roads that are dangerous as they don`t get gritted and thats where the bin lorries operate which is also where kids play in the street and people park cars.



As for the lazy copper comment, for most of my life ive worked 6 days a week including saturday mornings then played amatuer RL on a saturday afternoon straight from work, anyway the bin crews would prefer to be working now because like i said earlier in the thread they will miss out on a lot of xmas tips if their not out and about in the lead up to xmas

I had some parcels delivered via HGV today.

OF COURSE HGV's DON'T GO DOWN SIDE STREETS (do I need to state the bleedin' obvious to you). I was simply using the analogy, that HGVs are out there, driving to the conditions. If, and WHEN, the bin lorries do go out, they should do the same. They CRAWL down sidestreets when in conditions like this. After all, they aren't known for their speed (they should be crawling in good conditions, too. After all, they are going nowhere quickly). They've managed to do this in years gone past, in winters just as bad.
Going home now, where I shall be driving on clear roads, then onto side streets, where I shall drive to what the conditions dictate.

That will be from the pressure that a lot of courier companies put on drivers, its one of the lowest paid areas of driving where the drivers get treated like a door matt in the main. I wouldn`t mind betting that if that driver had caused any damage in your street, road or private estate due to the conditions then they would have ripped into him by saying "why the hell did you go down their when it wasn`t safe ?" yet if he didn`t deliver your parcel they would have said "What are you doing bringing this back ? Its only a bit of ice".

Courier firms that operate 16 tonne vehicles have a special dispensation to operate in resedential areas due to the nature of their work, its at the drivers discretion if he goes down the road or not when the conditions are bad but if he damages anything whilst attempting to deliver a parcel then he will get a right verbal hammering when he gets back, maybe worse due to negligence.