Middlesbrough Council is not alone in charging for garden waste – the number of households using the service has dropped again
Brown bins in use for the now subscription-based garden waste collection system(Image: Gareth Lightfoot/LDRS)
The number of households subscribing to Middlesbrough’s garden waste collection service has reduced year on year. Figures from the third year of the council service being charged-for shows another drop in the number of households who are signed up.
For 2024/25, the council netted close to £1m from residents signing up to the garden waste service – £919,840 to be exact – this was down in 2025/26 to £878,868. This figure has fallen for a second successive year, to £765,610. The number of households who are subscribed to the service fell from 21,436 in 2024/25 to 20,816 in 2025/26 and now sits at 18,429. The number of garden waste bins currently eligible for collection is 20,685, as households can pay for numerous bins.
This more than £2.5m over the course of three years is not a simple profit for the council, due to the costs of new bins in 2024 as well as the procurement of new waste collection vehicles. Charging for garden waste collection was introduced as a cost saving measure – back in 2024 – and the price has become a politicised figure. Currently, households must pay £40 for an initial bin to be collected, with a further £20 charge for each additional bin that they want collected on a fortnightly basis over much of spring, summer and autumn.
It should be noted that the figures were provided through a freedom of information request and were measured prior to May 5, 2026. It is possible that the figure for 2026/27 will see marginal increases as more people sign up throughout the summer, although the vast majority of people who would have signed up for collections this financial year will have already done so, with collections starting over a month before the date the figures were taken.
There were calls throughout the budget setting process earlier this year for the price of the service to be reduced or even scrapped for the 2026/27 financial year. This did not happen, and now attention will turn to 2027/28 to see if a reduction in the costs to residents is introduced as a budget measure prior to next year’s local elections.
Charging for garden waste has become the norm in recent years, as councils up and down the country look for ways to save money and make cuts wherever they can find them. The two councils that sandwich Middlesbrough ( Redcar and Stockton ) also charge for garden waste. Middlesbrough’s initial rollout in 2024 came under fire, with confusion about the old green bin pick up and complaints about an inability to opt in for the then-new brown bins.
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