And six wards have not been fined once in the last five years, data shows
HOUSEHOLDS in Cathays and Grangetown receive more fines for not sorting their bins properly than anywhere else in the Welsh capital, data shows.
Over the last five years, inner city wards received hundreds more bin fines – which cost £150 – compared with wards on the outskirts of Cardiff, according to a Freedom of Information request submitted by The Cardiffian.
Between April 2023 and March 2024, residents in Cathays and Grangetown received 238 and 208 fines respectively, making them the areas with the biggest numbers of fines for what Cardiff Council calls “the improper presentation of waste”.
The data also revealed that six wards received zero fixed penalty notices during the last five years. They are: Cyncoed, Lisvane and Thornhill, Pentyrch and St Fagans, Radyr and Morganstown, Rhiwbina, and Whitchurch and Tongwynlais.
In Cathays, some people say the large student population is a reason for the fines. Paulus Thurlbeck regularly posts reminders on Facebook on bin days to help students avoid them.
Mr Thurlbeck, who works closely with the Your Cathays community support project, suggested that one reason for the fines was down to arguments between housemates, who often don’t know each other prior to moving in.
“You could have seven people in a house and five of them clean the house religiously, one of them sits on the fence, and then there’s one person in every house that’s going to work against everyone else,” he said.
The population in Cathays also changes regularly. This is true in Grangetown as well, volunteer Fiona McAllister of Keep Grangetown Tidy suggested.
“If you have people who don’t live in an area for long, maybe they don’t learn the rules,” she said.
Those found to have not sorted their rubbish properly are warned with a pink sticker on their bins, explaining why they were not collected.
Only when a household receives three stickers in a 12-week period are they issued a fixed penalty notice fine of £150.
But, Ms McAllister said that she didn’t see many bags with pink stickers in Grangetown, adding that she thought the number of fines was surprisingly low.
“If they’re not putting the stickers on the bags, they’re not doing the fines. I expect the real scale is bigger than that.”
Ceri John Davies of Keep Cathays Tidy suggested the difference in fines between wards could be because of a lack of space in some homes for recycling.
“The reality of small, often multiple occupancy, dwellings is that having that space to clean, separate out, and then put into the required outside bags is difficult.
“We’re not putting fines into Llanishen or St Fagans or the wealthier areas because they’ve got large houses where you can do this and you’ve got spaces to store everything before bin day.”
Resident Sheila Smith of Llanishen, an area which has only received two fines in the last five years, agreed.
“For me in my house with space, it is dead easy to recycle,” she said.
Ms Smith, who volunteers with Llanishen Litter Pickers, said it would be better to reward those who put out their bins properly, rather than punishing those who don’t.
“Maybe we use a carrot approach instead of the stick to encourage recycling.”
A Cardiff Council spokesperson said that fixed penalty notices were issued on a case by case basis to properties in breach of the relevant legislation, and that households who persistently improperly present waste can expect to be issued a fixed penalty notice.
“The council provides receptacles for people to recycle their waste from their home, with clear instructions on how to use them. Whether a resident is still using the ‘green bag scheme’, or the ‘sack scheme’, recyclables need to be put into the correct container for collection so the items can be recycled.
“Through the ‘sack scheme’, the contamination rate, items that are put out for recycling but cannot in fact be recycled, has reduced by 26%.
“With the ‘green bag scheme’, 30% of the items put out for recycling could not be recycled. With the sack scheme, 4% of materials that are put out for recycling cannot be recycled. So the quality of recycling through the ‘sack sort scheme’ is significantly better.”
Councillor Norma Mackie, Cabinet Member for Waste, Street Scene & Environmental Services said: “The new recycling scheme has now been delivered to all houses in the city, with a slightly modified scheme being delivered to purpose-built flats later in the year.
“While the new scheme still requires some bedding in and further education for some, we are really pleased with the results so far in relation to the quality and amount of recyclable materials now being collected.”
