Heaps of decaying trash are finally being cleared from Birmingham’s foul streets during an ongoing dispute between the council and striking garbage collectors. 

Thousands of frustrated residents have been caught in the crossfire during the months-long row between union barons and council chiefs.

A full-scale strike, which started in March, has left waste piling up on pavements and in roads, sparking city-wide public health fears. 

The conflict seems to be nearing resolution, as piles of black garbage bags have disappeared in some areas and large bins, once overfilled with waste, have been emptied.   

Scheduled collections have resumed and the council seems to be gaining ground in its clash with the striking refuse workers, as the financially troubled Labour-led authority is now spending millions on temporary workers to fill in for those on strike. 

However, although additional workers have been employed, recycling pickups remain halted. The disagreement is not entirely resolved, as the Unite union escalated the situation today, stating the strike might persist into March of the following year.

In a statement, Unite’s national lead officer Onay Kasab declared, ‘Strike action will persist as long as necessary with Unite’s unwavering support.’

‘The political response towards these workers, marked by falsehoods about unaffected pay and unfulfilled promises of retraining for non-existent driving roles, is among the worst instances ever witnessed by Unite,’ he added. 

‘The only way this dispute will end is with a fair and reasonable deal for Birmingham’s bin workers.’

The escalation was backed by Birmingham’s bin workers who voted overwhelmingly in support of it, with 99.5 per cent in favour out of a turnout of 72 per cent, Unite said. 

Birmingham City Council now increasingly seems to be trying to outlast the siege, having spent more than £6.5million on agency staff, who are unable to strike without losing pay.

It comes after the authority walked away from talks with the union in July, after claiming it had offered all it could. 

The council has since applied for contempt of court proceedings against Unite for allegedly breaching a court-ordered injunction preventing striking workers blocking bin lorries at depots and on the streets.

According to the council, Unite members have allegedly been ‘stepping in front of, and even leaning against, moving heavy vehicles and blocking road junctions’.

However, this has been disputed with a bin lorry loader claiming the picket lines ‘haven’t been a problem’ since the legal action was sparked in July. 

‘We have to work; we don’t have a choice,’ he told The Times. ‘If we don’t work, we don’t get paid, simple as that. But I support them. Why should they have to lose money which they have been on for years?’

The argument was triggered by the scrapping of the waste recycling and collection officer role, created after refuse workers took industrial action in 2017 over pay. 

The new position, which was a sweetener in the negotiations to end the walkout, came with higher salary and increased levels of responsibility. 

But the Labour council rowed back on the job, saying it needed to be axed in an effort to balance its books. 

It came after a landmark legal ruling on equal pay, which left the authority with a staggering £760million bill for paying traditionally female roles less. 

In 2023, the council declared bankruptcy as officials desperately scrambled to try and overcome its vast financial blackhole. 

However, the move to axe the role sparked outrage, with Unite saying it would lead to an £8,000-a-year pay cut for about 150 workers. 

Birmingham disputed the figures. It insisted the number of staff could have seen their salaries cut was 17, with these workers potentially losing a maximum of £6,000.

The council said the affected staff had been offered the chance to move to an alternative role at the current grade, to train as drivers or to take voluntary redundancy. Employees also had the option to work as loaders with pay protection.

But the union then claimed the council’s plan to downgrade refuse lorry driver roles would see some drivers having their salaries slashed by £400 a month.

Unite firebrand boss, Sharon Graham, has accused Birmingham of a ‘fire and rehire’ policy, where employees are let go and the recruited again on a new contract under different terms and conditions. 

‘They have said to these workers that the job that you do, the pay that you get, you either do that job now for £8,000 less or go,’ Ms Graham said.

‘In any other situation we would be calling this out as fire and rehire. Equal pay does not mean you cut the pay of workers. It’s supposed to mean you push up the pay of women, if it’s commensurate with the role that men are doing.’

The council says all roles across the authority were being evaluated against the nationally recognised ‘Gauge’ job evaluation system, which ‘trade unions have agreed to’. 

While John Cotton, Birmingham’s council leader, insisted the authority had reached the ‘absolutely limit’ of what it could offer without opening itself up to another equal pay bill that could cost it hundreds of millions pounds. 

And as the row continues to rumble on, it appears some of the striking workers appear to have buckled. A third of the 170 bin lorry drivers have reportedly already taken voluntary redundancy, according to a BBC report in July. 

Despite this, Unite remained defiant, with Ms Graham today accusing the Labour government of getting involved and blocking a potential deal to end the strikes. 

Unite said talks brokered by the conciliation service Acas in May led by the council’s chief executive Joanne Roney agreeing a ‘ball park’ deal which would have ‘ended the dispute’. 

‘Throughout this dispute the government has denied any involvement. It is now clear that commissioners reporting to Angela Rayner blocked a ball park deal thrashed out at ACAS,’ Ms Graham added in a statement on Tuesday.

‘The recent amendment by the government to the Employment Rights Bill, that allows councils in debt to fire and rehire their workers shows what is really going on here.

‘Council workers are being lined up to pay the price for years of austerity.’