Slough councillor told to "stop" emailing over bin concerns

Independent councillor Madhuri Bedi (Foxborough) said she emailed Slough Borough Council officers about four times to get answers on missed pick-ups as well as to get a response if the weekly bin collections are going to swap to fortnightly.

The email chain originated from Cllr Chandra Muvvala (Con: Langley Kedermister), who copied in every elected representative as he believed the bin issues affected all wards and wanted everyone involved.

But Cllr Bedi said her queries were getting “ignored” by officers and kept sending follow-up messages to everyone on the mailing list. Eventually, Cllr Christine Hulme (Lab: Central), lead member for children’s services, told her and the Conservatives to “remove” her email distribution list as they are “clogging up” her inbox.

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Speaking at a full council meeting on Thursday, July 21, Cllr Bedi said she eventually did get an answer, saying only cabinet can decide on the changes to bin collections.

She said: “I would have thought it would be important for cabinet members to hear the concerns of all ward councillors no matter what form they come as they would be in a better position to involve efficient decision-making.

“However, from this email, it appears such decisions will only be taken by listening to the opinions of Labour councillors.”

Council leader James Swindlehurst (Lab: Cippenham Green) said it was “always clear” that this change will be a political decision and a paper is to come to cabinet in September.

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He also said that the email chain became “full of random instances of casework” about individual bin collections where ‘not every member’ needs to know about it.

“I would publically ask that I be removed from that email tree as well because it’s clogging up my inbox now,” Cllr Swindlehurst said.