A prickly smell of rotten garbage fills the air. The garbage bin pile bags, some slopes their holiday contents. And, with the red parts of the city, at least one resident has stated that he has been bitten by a rat.
With its heritage as a power of manufacture and its proud civic history, Birmingham likes to call the second British city.
Right now it is the country’s garbage capital.
A stop between waste workers and city officials has left approximately 17,000 tons of junk piled on the streets of the city that attract rats, foxes, cockroaches and magicians. On Monday, the municipality of Birmingham declared an « important incident », which allows it to access more resources from the Government and other nearby regions.
Some collections of garbage are still taking place and the city has managed to maintain many areas, including the center, in the garbage. But in various residential districts and parks it was very evident on Wednesday.
At Small Heath, a neighborhood two kilometers from the city center, black plastic bags had accumulated at the end of some streets and people from other areas had been added to the mess by sending the garbage without collection.
« I have lived in England for 36 years. I had never seen a situation like this, » said Javad Javadi, 51, a delivery driver originally from Iran, as he passed in front of overflowing plastic bins who lined the Malmesbury road.
« Of course, at night, if you come after ten, you see many rats, » he said. « So many that cats do not pursue them. »
Birmingham’s rubbish stack has led to a political stench in the Parliament of Britain where Jim McMahon, a ruler Labor Party Minister, warned of the public health risks and a Birmingham legislator, preet Kaur Gill, said that a constituent had written to say « they had been stung by a rate. »
An opposition legislator, Julian Lewis, compared the situation with a famous 1978 garbage collection strike during industrial riots under the labor government of James Callaghan. The period became known as the « winter of discontent », and the following year, the work lost a general election, and began Margaret Thatcher in power.
This dispute, however, is limited to Birmingham, where more than 350 workers began to walk limited in January that last month was climbed on an indefinite strike on a complete scale.
« We cannot tolerate a situation that causes damage and anxiety to the communities, » said Birmingham City Council leader John Cotton statement.
Union members say that a restructuring plan promoted by the municipality would leave around 150 workers Up to 8,000 pounds (about $ 10,400) a poorest year. The Council disputes it, saying that « the number of staff who could lose the maximum amount (just over £ 6,000) is 17 people. »
While the two parts are blocked, the results were evident in Malmesbury Road, where black plastic bags went to both ends of the street and in a halfway. Some desperate residents had begun to bring the garbage to the discharge.
While loading about 20 sacks in his car, Shakeel Ahmed explained that the garbage had accumulated for three weeks outside his house and his garden shed.
Leading to a waste installation, Mr. Ahmed, 69, a retired train manager, kept his windows open and apologized for the smell of his car, adding that he would be cleaned professionally after depositing the trash. « If I get angry, he will not solve the problem, » he said philosophically.
At the Tyseley recycling and recycling center, a few kilometers south -east of the city center, others had a similar story about the stench, poison and damage to the city’s reputation.
« We cannot open the window by the smell, it is a junk everywhere, it is ridiculous, » said Rubina Yaqoob, 43, describing the situation in Stechford, in Eastern Birmingham. His vehicle is new and had aligned the trunk with a sheet before loading it with 10 bags of junk. « Look at my car! » He said, pointing to the mess that had made the garbage.
Some do not have this option, including Robert Shaw, 60, a school cleaner, who has been found by living next to a pile of rejection bags in Henshaw Road. « What the advice told us is that we can bring it to Tysey, » he said. « But if you don’t have a car, how should you take it? »
The crisis has forced some inhabitants of the city to be inventive. Tasnima Tafader, sitting in the sun of Morris Park, waiting to pick up his three children from school, Tascima Tafader explained how her husband had called relatives to find space in their bins for some of the family’s rubbish. His mother passed.
Then, when a waste truck arrived at 7.30 in the morning, the residents left their houses to load street bags on the truck, said Ms. Tafader, 34, performer.
In another Tysey deposit, the forwards gathered at their doors in front of the rejection trucks, delaying their journeys walking in front of them to the rhythm of a snail for several hundred meters.
Lee Haven, a member of the United Union United, played the city’s statement that no worker « should not lose money », arguing that the planned changes could cost about £ 600 per month at a time when home bills increase abruptly.
The origins of the dispute are in 2023 when the City Council of Birmingham was essentially declared bankruptcyin part as a result of equal payment cases brought by workers and began to be implemented in great reach cuts to services.
As part of a restructuring plan, the municipality now wants to scrape a position of the refusal equipment, known as the responsible recycling and waste collection, which says that it does not exist in other municipalities. Workers in this role can take voluntary redundancy or move to another position.
He says that simplifying the wage structure is crucial and maintaining the paper would be able to « create a huge payment responsible for equality », but he rejected requests to explain exactly why.
« There is a feeling that we are made an expiatory goat, » said Mr. Haven, as around ten police officers looked at. « I think the family of the normal working class of this country will understand that no one can afford to take this £ 600 loss. »
Even when they are in the state of their streets, some inhabitants of the city sympathize with waste collectors.
« I don’t blame them because I don’t think the salaries should be cut, » said Zeenat Hussain, 53, administrator of the Saltley Health Service. « What they do is an essential job. »
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