A POTENTIAL merger of bin collections across Worcestershire has been lampooned by a leading politician - who has labelled it "reckless" and "wrong".

Councillor Peter McDonald, who leads the Labour group at County Hall, says he fears refuse pick-ups could be hived off to the private sector.

As your Worcester News revealed yesterday, Worcestershire County Council is set to try and secure Government funding to do a 'bins audit' to finally work out how much cash could be saved by merging the service.

A deal, which could involve Herefordshire is being explored because of the rising costs of dealing with rubbish, which has now hit £57 million a year across the two counties.

The Conservative cabinet is meeting tomorrow to endorse a recommendation to try and find cash for the audit.

Cllr McDonald's criticism has been refuted by the Tory leadership, which says he is jumping the gun as there are no suggestions at all at this point.

Councillor McDonald said: "The county council is ignoring the wishes of the six districts, treating them with utter contempt.

"There is no wish for privatisation of this service from any of the districts, however the county’s obsession of privatisation no matter the costs and wishes of those concerned are ignored for privateers to make a profit out of public services and thus pushing costs up.

"It is reckless and irresponsible of the county council by stealth or other means to privatise a service that has such high satisfaction levels throughout the county.

"The only reason privateers will take over this service is to make profits and that could well jeopardise the present level of service and the terms and conditions of those employed."

A recent review of bin collections found some concern among the district councils, which collect household refuse, over losing one of their key services under a centralised system.

But Councillor Anthony Blagg, cabinet member for the environment at the county council, said: "Some of the districts already outsource this like Wychavon, Herefordshire, and Malvern are looking at it too.

"But there is no ulterior motive here by Worcestershire County Council or the districts, we all want to make waste collection and disposal as efficient as possible and if that's in-house, if it's cheaper that way, no problem.

"A lot of detailed work needs to be done and this is about trying to find Government money to do that, but there are no ulterior motives."

The county council disposes of the waste while the district authorities collect it, creating seven different, expensive ways of working across Worcestershire.

The investigation on possible savings led by County Hall comes at a time when Worcester City Council is already trying to outsource its own bin collections to the private sector from 2017 onwards.