Waste Collection: Birmingham and the West Midlands

Debate between Tahir Ali and Preet Kaur Gill

Wednesday 21st January 2026 Westminster Hall

[Preet Kaur Gill (Birmingham Edgbaston) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey. I thank the right hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton) for securing this debate.

Birmingham is the city where I was born and raised, and the one that I have had the privilege to represent for the past eight years. It is a proud, resilient city of hard-working families, students, older people, businesses and communities who care deeply about the place they call home. Yet for more than a year, those communities have been living with a broken waste collection service: overflowing bins, rising fly-tipping and streets that do not feel clean or safe. These are not minor inconveniences; they are public health risks, environmental hazards and a source of stress for many families, for those with mobility challenges, for older residents and for everyone who cares about their neighbourhood.

Last year I wrote to the council, urging it to declare a public health emergency, and it did so. That declaration allowed the Government to provide logistical support and for waste to be collected. But the reality is that the dispute has dragged on for far too long, and residents are paying the price. We need to be honest about how we got here. Years of Conservative austerity and underfunding of local government hollowed out councils such as Birmingham, with nearly £1 billion of funding having been cut since 2010, the workforce halved, services that people relied on stretched and resilience stripped away.

On top of that, historical equal pay liabilities—some dating back decades—have placed immense pressure on the council’s finances. Those pressures are not abstract numbers. They shape whether residents get their bins emptied, whether streets are clean and whether public services can function effectively. That context matters, because it explains why any solution now must be sustainable. It is about fairness: fairness for women in being paid the same as men, and fairness for the citizens of Birmingham in knowing that their money is being spent on the services they need.

Let me be clear about my position: I am on the side of Birmingham’s residents. I am not here to take sides between the council and the union, or to attack anyone involved. My concern is the people who live, work and raise families in our city, and who depend on a clean and reliable waste service. I support the transformation of Birmingham’s waste service because, before the industrial action began, I regularly received complaints from constituents about missed collections. Residents and businesses deserve a service that is modern, reliable and in line with other major cities.

[Tahir Ali]

I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for giving way. On fairness of pay, does she agree that we should not be equalising downwards, but that women’s pay should be equalised up to what men are paid?

[Preet Kaur Gill]

Prior to coming to this place, I worked for the city council for many years. I saw the impact of equal pay liabilities, and how they cripple public finances and the very services that the last Labour Government invested in. Children’s services were decommissioned and youth services were stripped away, and many of my communities do not want to see our city council’s public finances go in the same direction. That is why the council must take legal advice, and the right steps, to agree and come to a settled negotiation.

The council does now have a plan for transformation, including a new fleet of council-owned vehicles, changes to how services will be monitored and a phased roll-out of a new collection model from June 2026. But transformation cannot mean endless disruption, and it cannot come at the cost of reopening equal pay liabilities, which would put the council back into crisis and risk hundreds of millions more being taken away from public services—this is taxpayers’ money that we are talking about.

Our Government also have a role to play. Having raised the issue of fair funding for Birmingham with Ministers, I was pleased to see that the local government finance settlement will increase the council’s core spending power by more than £650 million over the next three years. Ministers must now also hold Birmingham’s commissioners to account; they must bring both sides back to the table and reach a negotiated settlement. Leadership and accountability are required at every level.

Next week, I will meet directly with Unite workers to hear their perspective, to understand the challenges they face and make sure that their voices are a part of any solution. Let me be clear that residents, not politics, must be the priority. My message to all parties is simple: “Enough is enough. It is time to return to the table in good faith. It is time for negotiation, compromise and delivery.” The council, the commissioners, the workers and the union leadership all have a responsibility to make that happen. The Government must ensure that the conditions are in place for a settlement to succeed, alongside holding commissioners to account, and secure agreement, not stalemate.

Birmingham is a proud city, and its people are patient, but that patience has been tested long enough. It is time to end this dispute and restore a reliable waste service that puts residents and businesses first.

Telegraph Poles: Birmingham

Debate between Tahir Ali and Preet Kaur Gill

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Preet Kaur Gill]

I thank the hon. Member for that important point about the business model. There are alternative ways to implement the infrastructure. In areas like his, this activity does not respect the environment, heritage or planning laws, and we end up with poles erected. Some of them do not even have any lines going through them, which just goes to show that the existing infrastructure meant there was no need for that, but, as he says, it is clearly quite a lucrative business model to sell on the new infrastructure.

[Tahir Ali (Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for giving way. We had similar issues with Brsk when it went on to an unadopted road in a conservation area and started erecting poles. My constituents, Dr Carole McKeown —the secretary for Reddings and Amesbury Road residents association—and her neighbour came to see me. Following the intervention of the Minister, Brsk has agreed to remove the poles, but the point remains that the consultation with and notification of the residents did not happen. These are not isolated incidents. Does my hon. Friend agree that there needs to be tougher action against companies that go about their business without any adherence to the code of conduct?

[Preet Kaur Gill]

I know that the Minister, in summing up, will address that point, because he has been proactive in meeting the regulator and the companies tasked with installing this infrastructure. He has already given them a clear indication of where the Government will go next if they do not adhere to the code. I also know that he has met Brsk since the previous debate on the issue; I thank him for that.

I was interested to read confirmation that Brsk now has guaranteed access to BT Openreach infrastructure to install broadband lines underground, so why is it not doing so? It is not its business model—that is why it is not doing it. I would be interested to learn from the Minister when that was agreed, because Brsk has not been taking advantage of that in my constituency to date.

Some providers are much better at this. I want to ensure that not everybody is painted with the same brush. There are some very good providers. Last year, broadband infrastructure carried out by Pipeline Utilities on behalf of Grain Connect left Willow Avenue in my constituency with some dreadful retarmacking, as well as broken and cracked paving slabs. When I wrote to the organisation about this, it confirmed that the site was inspected, and agreed to replace and relay the broken paving slabs and tarmac. That is exactly how we should be proceeding.

My experience with Brsk has been very different. Repeatedly, it will arrive in an area to erect new broadband infrastructure poles without properly consulting residents or me. We have seen that behaviour on Vernon Road, Clarendon Road, Chad Road and Stirling Road. The company’s idea of consultation appears to be to put up a notice stating its intention to put up another pole—in some cases, with little to no consultation period. Sometimes, I am told, a notice has not gone up at all, despite my best efforts and those of my constituents to raise concerns about the siting of the poles. We have been ignored. This means that the infrastructure ends up causing issues that could have been foreseen or avoided if there were proper consultation.

Poles have been erected in the middle of pavements, obstructing prams, wheelchairs and people with mobility issues. There have been attempts to erect unsightly poles in front of listed buildings, instead of exploring other options. Some roads are being peppered with poles, even when we are told they are a last resort. It is time for stronger action. Clearly, Brsk is not heeding Government advice.

As we all know, since the rules were changed by the previous Government in 2016, there is no requirement for planning permission for poles up to 15 metres in height, and there is no legal requirement for consultation with local residents and businesses. Good practice asks telecoms communications operators to notify the council of their intention to install a pole, as well as to advertise their development proposal within the vicinity of the site, usually via a site notice, but in reality there is no real opportunity to object to an installation. There needs to be a strategy that targets areas of need and uses existing infrastructure.

We are all familiar with the fact that the Electronic Communications Code (Conditions and Restrictions) Regulations 2003 require that, among other things, operators must share apparatus where possible, and use underground rather than overground lines where they can—yet that is not happening in practice. I know roads where as many as five or six poles have been erected. It is ugly, disruptive and excessive, and it impacts on house prices.

As these issues are a matter for the regulator, Ofcom, I seek the Minister’s clarification on what monitoring of these requirements is being carried out to ensure that network providers collaborate and share network infrastructure, and what action Ofcom has been taking against providers who have been found to not comply. When I wrote to Ofcom, it said its role is

“limited to enforcement of the Regulations”

and that, under those,

“operators have significant flexibility…to put up their own poles.”

I know that the Minister has been looking at a revision of the code of practice. We would be grateful if he could say more on that. I also welcome that he has stated that he reserves the right to change the law in this area.

It strikes me that stronger adherence to the regulations on sharing infrastructure is one of those rare examples where stronger regulation will actually save companies and consumers money. Surely it is cheaper for companies to co-ordinate with one another over the sharing of infrastructure than to erect new poles every time they need a new node for their network. It is baffling and frustrating that providers such as Brsk have not been more proactive in anticipating the concerns of the public before Ofcom has had to get involved. Fundamentally, my constituents of Birmingham Edgbaston are asking for respect: respect to influence decisions, and to ensure that broadband infrastructure is implemented in a way that respects their local environment, heritage and public interest.

I would be grateful if the Minister could provide an update on work to amend and strengthen the code of practice, so that operators respond to and engage in good faith with residents. I would also be keen to hear the outcome of his recent engagement with Brsk, having shared with him my experience of dealing with it, and to understand what more we can do to ensure that providers work together to share infrastructure, and that the requirements under the 2003 regulations are adhered to and enforced. I thank the Minister for his attention and look forward to working with him.