The service, which runs fortnightly from 15 February–17 December 2021, was temporarily suspended during the COVID-19 lockdown in order for the council to redeploy staff and prioritise essential waste and recycling collections. Fortunately, the service was only suspended for one month and became operational much sooner than anticipated with residents only missing two collections.

To make up for these missed collections, the council will be providing a special service from 18 January to 12 February 2021. During these four weeks, residents who subscribed to the 2020 service will be able to present their bins with their 2020 payment sticker clearly visible and receive these two fortnightly collections.

In order to receive all 22 collections for the 2021 service, residents must register for garden waste collections by Friday 18 December. The price for the service is £49 per bin.

To further align the waste services across all three towns, Bournemouth’s 140-litre garden waste bins are also being replaced with 240-litre bins in line with Christchurch and Poole.

A BCP Council spokesperson commented, “Our current garden waste service is popular with 51,000 households across Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole registering in 2020, and over 10,300 tonnes of garden waste collected in 2019/20. These collections help promote our sustainable environment objective, leading the community towards a cleaner future by encouraging sustainable resource management, as the waste that’s collected is turned into a high-quality compost, which can then be used in agriculture.”

For more information and to apply online, visit: www.bcpcouncil.gov.uk/gardenwaste