DARLINGTON Borough Council has defended its holiday wheelie bin collection service as residents took to social media this week to complain about missed collections and abandoned litter.

This Christmas and New Year marked the first since the controversial wheelie bin system was introduced last October.

For some residents it has not gone smoothly as many took to the council’s facebook page to complain about the service.

Eamont Drive residents in particular were unhappy with missed collections and cardboard being left to blow around the streets, despite residents being told via the council’s own website that excess cardboard would be collected over the holiday period.

Similar complaints have been posted by residents unhappy at their street being missed for collections, when adjacent streets were cleared.

Responding to the criticism, the council’s head of environmental services, Brian Graham, said: “During Christmas and New Year, the amount of waste generated increases significantly.

“To cope with this extra demand, we hire in additional vehicles to make sure that over this busy two to three week period, households have a collection of both household and recyclable waste.

“At the same time, we have been taking additional waste left by the side of bins.

“Because we schedule in extra collections by the additional vehicles to cope with the increased waste, normal collection times may have changed so we advise households to have their bins out ready for collection before 7am to ensure that they are emptied.

“There have been a few incidents where bins were missed and we have gone back to empty those bins as soon as we have been able to slot that visit in to the collection timetable.”