The rubbish has been collected today (June 22) from the streets of Radstock, but in other areas covered by B&NES there is growing unhappiness about the waste services.

Nub News has been told that all the drivers walked out of the recycling depot in Keynsham in a dispute over pay. We have approached B&NES for comment but have yet to have a response. They have put up vacancies for drivers needed at the site and for help working with the recycling crews.

Meantime, at the weekend a resident of Radstock told Nub News that the recycling and waste collections locally have turned chaotic. " Waste and recycling collections not completed - missed collections not being picked up, " They told us. " Do we get any rebate for the gross failure by waste & recycling services ? "

That is also the question being posed over in Paulton.

Local councillor Grant Johnson has said that since the start of the year he has had numerous separate notifications of waste and recycling collection problems for his ward.

The Cllr said: " There have been 24 weeks of collections since the start of the year with nine of those having problems raised in my ward, representing a 37.5% chance that residents in Paulton are likely to have a missed collection."

If B&NES are being troubled by lack of staff, they are not alone : Over the border in Mendip, Somerset Waste has warned that their waste collections are also being hit due to a lack of drivers.

In a letter circulated to local authority partners on June 11, the Somerset Waste Partnership admitted it had been "a challenging couple of weeks", adding that its crews had been "under prolonged pressure for most than a year".

According to a report by the Local Democracy team the HGV driver shortage – estimated at 70,000 drivers nationwide – has been worsened by a number of factors, including the coronavirus pandemic (which affected training and testing), EU drivers leaving the UK after Brexit, and rising demand from the reopening of non-essential retail.