Recycle plan to tackle New Town vermin

The New Town could be included in a pilot food recycling scheme, if three city centre councillors get their way.

The historic area has been exempted from the use of large black bins because of fears they would ruin the streetscape, but the bin bags used in their place are often torn apart by seagulls, leaving litter strewn across the pavement.

Councillors Joanna Mowat, David Beckett and Charles Dundas are putting forward a motion to Tuesday's meeting of the Transport, Infrastructure and Environment Committee asking that the New Town should be used to pilot a food recycling scheme.

They hope that food scraps could be disposed of in small bins with lockable lids and collected separately from the rest of the rubbish.

Cllr Mowat said the city council would have to cut the amount of waste going to landfill in the coming years and food recycling would assist in this, as well as cutting the number of seagull attacks. "To have something that stops the vermin attacks has to be a positive way forward. We have to divert our waste and my view is lets do this sooner rather than later," she said.