Liberation Day

Absolute scenes in Moseley today as jubilant residents packed the streets to cheer the victorious return of waste collection. A relieved community finally got to throw off the shackles of thousands of Amazon boxes.

Bewildered waste management professionals expressed surprise as young women (and men, it’s worth remembering that waste collection is not a gender defined role anymore) threw themselves at their conquering heroes. One BCC employee told us “We should go on strike more often LOL, actually we haven’t even been on strike this time. Why haven’t we been here before?”

An inquiry into why we have been piling up boxes for months showed an entirely innocent explanation. A senior City Council employee told us “We’ve looked into why recycling in South Birmingham has failed in 2019 and we’ve found out that it was essentially Alan’s fault. Alan does the scheduling for collections and as such is an essential element of how the finely balanced machine that is Birmingham works. Alan, and his wife Jean went to Lanzarote at Easter, it’s a really good opportunity to catch that early sun as being so close to the equator it has those summer temperatures all year round. Anyway, whilst Alan was on holiday he had gone to the Wax Sports Bar to watch Aston Villa vs Milwall. On getting a real insight into Villa’s promotion prospects it’s fair to say that Alan might have drunk a bit too much and as a result slipped quite badly and seriously put his back out. So, to cut a long story short, Alan’s been off work since Easter and he’s got the password for the software. Which means we largely forgot about south Birmingham. You’ll be pleased to know that Alan is back at work and despite some twinges is feeling much better. We’ve now taken steps to make sure this doesn’t happen again and Alan has put his password on a Post-It note on his computer.

Also, you know we have tips don’t you? You could just get rid of it yourself.”