A UNION representing Glasgow’s refuse collectors has claimed the city’s waste service is at breaking point following a decade of cuts.

In a video posted online from a back court in Maryhill, a GMB representative, who works for Glasgow City Council, claims the service is in crisis and a threat to public health and safety.

During the footage taken at Henderson Street/Garrioch Street, GMB convenor Chris Mitchell urged the local authority to release funds to benefit the “under-staffed and under-resourced” workforce.

The video shows him pointing at piles of rubbish which have built up in the back court.

It comes after an FOI revealed more than 2700 bin collections have been missed across the city since last summer.

Glasgow City Council has defended its service where 525 full-time workers undertake more than 21 million household bin collections every year.

As of August this year, the council employes a combined total of 1091 street sweepers and refuse collectors.

The number of cleansing staff, who collect bins, has risen by more than 100 workers since 2017 – when numbers were at 419.

At the council’s budget meeting in February, savings of £446,000 were agreed for bin replacement services across the city.

A further saving of £275,000 was expected to be made by shifting to bin collections once every three weeks, due to be piloted before roll out across Glasgow.

The GMB Union – which represents around 90 per cent of the council’s refuse collection workforce – says “over stretched workers” are toiling in “dire” conditions and need need more people to share the load.

Mr Mitchell said:“We have been campaigning about Glasgow’s waste crisis and our working conditions for years.

“The video is another example of what over a decade of cuts looks like but maybe the interest it’s received means the penny is finally starting to drop.

READ MORE: Glasgow council chiefs snub apology after summer of bins and parks ‘chaos’

“Certainly we’ve warned our service managers and successive council leaderships that without a significant investment in more full time staff and resources this problem won’t go away, it will only continue to get worse.”

Mr Mitchell also highlighted problems with some of the working conditions staff face on a daily basis.

He went on: “The morale of the workforce is absolutely through the floor. Collections are unsustainable, our depots are filthy and it’s no exaggeration to say many of our colleagues are suffering mentally and physically.

“The message we would like to get out to the public is that we are doing our best with what we have but what we have is not nearly enough and the prospect of more cuts in the next budget will have dire consequences.

“The city can’t put a ­sticking plaster over this problem now, it’s too far

gone. That’s why we made this plea on social media.

“We are standing up for our members, our service and for Glasgow – because if we don’t then who will?”

Opposition members have said that the situation is “appalling but not surprising”. They say that the council needs to help workers to run the service as effectively as possible.

Councillor Martha Wardrop (Green) said: “There are areas of the city where waste collections are causing serious problems and require urgent action. We’re also seeing negligible improvements in annual recycling rates in the face of a climate crisis.

“The Green budget this year rejected cuts to waste collections and called for a significant investment in tackling the climate emergency. We believe these services must be a focus for investment not cuts.

“Where there’s a case for more investment we will support that, but we also want to see improvements now, which can only be achieved if everyone works together.”

Labour councillor Paul Carey said: “I’m appalled at the footage of this video although not surprised. This city in the last two and a half years has gone from one of the cleanest cities in the UK to one of the dirtiest. The cleansing service under this minority administration has been cut to the bone.

“At full council last week the Labour group put forward a motion asking the minority administration to ask the Scottish Government for more money for this city, particularly with regards to cleansing.

“The SNP amended the motion and took the reference out to ask for more money, this was backed by the Green party.”

“Going forward in my opinion this is going to be very difficult for the minority administration to justify these brutal cuts. Indeed I think it’s going to get very difficult for them, as the people of this city have had enough.”

Conservative councillor Thomas Kerr said the administration needed to take back control of the department.

He said: “What we’ve seen in this video from our hard-working cleansing staff is utterly appalling but not surprising.

“The SNP have presided over a summer of

chaos resulting in bin collections being missed,

grass being uncut and our parks falling into disrepair.

“Empty talk isn’t enough it is time the administration put the people of Glasgow first and sorted out this issue.”

READ MORE: Possilpark residents say they have been invaded by rodents - because of missed bin collections

At last week’s full council meeting, Councillor Anna Richardson was asked to apologise for a “summer of chaos” which left bins uncollected across Glasgow for weeks.

Ms Richardson, the city convenor for sustainability and carbon reduction, said the council was providing new street bins as well as replacing back court bins.

She said: “Members will be aware of the ongoing role out of street bins and sensors to monitor capacity, the replacement of the back court bins and the commitment to replacing our ageing fleet with new fit for purpose vehicles that will make refuse collections safer and more sustainable for our teams.”

The councillor added that the new neighbourhood model, which sees the same team allocated to the same route every day, would require a period of adjustment for everyone.

Discussing the state of the court featured in the video a spokesman for the council said: “The condition of this bin court is absolutely unacceptable. Tenement bin courts are scheduled to be serviced every week and there should not be such a build of waste at an individual address.

“We are currently investigating to find out exactly how this bin court ended up in this condition.

“Appropriate action will be taken once we have looked further into this matter.”

Speaking previously on waste collection, the council said: “We undertake over 21 million household bin collections every year and more than 99.9 per cent of collections are completed satisfactorily.

“However, we do understand the inconvenience that a missed collection can cause, particularly in relation to kerbside collections.

“If a collection is missed we always look to resolve the matter as soon as possible.”