Nicky Marr: Rubbish on the streets is symptom of a bigger problem
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Edinburgh is filthy. As I write, the city is in day four of a 12-day strike by waste staff, and the rubbish is rising. Public bins are overflowing, and there are papers, bottles, cans, take-away cups and cartons, and leftover food all over the street.
There are piles of bin bags collecting on corners, and neat little piles of dog poo accumulating under smelly bins.
All of Edinburgh’s waste disposal teams are on strike, meaning no collection from homes, no public bins emptied, and no street-cleaning. Recycling facilities are closed too.
Seagulls are thrilled. The city seems poised, ready for the mice and rats to emerge.
Individual businesses are trying hard to keep the patches in front of their own premises tidy, but there’s an endless supply of detritus to fill in behind each sweep of the broom.
Here is a stark example of what a valuable service our council waste teams provide. And of how valuable, yet undervalued, the “essential workers” of the pandemic really are.
These strikes are coming to other corners of the country. Brace yourselves, Highland and Moray... it’s really not pleasant.
Of course, the situation might be resolved by the time you read this. A five per cent pay offer was put to unions last Friday, and word is not yet through as to whether it will be accepted.
Edinburgh City Council say they can’t afford a bigger increase than the 3.5 per cent rejected; union leaders claim members can’t afford to live on the offers made. The council has called upon the Scottish Government to release reserves to help it to afford a pay deal, but so far, no joy.
But what is the solution? This latest mess is just another symptom of how broken our poor rich country is.
It’s heart-breaking that decent people working full-time can’t afford to live on the wages they are paid.
With 10 per cent inflation set to rise to 13 per cent in coming months, the country is on its knees.
Add to that a broken, underfunded NHS, a care system full of underpaid staff, a joke of a public transport system and I am embarrassed to be British. How can it have got to this, and so quickly?
And yet look at the contrasts. The wages of the best paid are rising. The profits banks and energy companies are making are obscene.
I can’t see a solution.
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It’s a fundamental human right for people to be paid a living wage. I don’t mean the current £9.90 an hour, as with current rates of inflation, and predicted energy price hikes, that won’t keep the wolf – or the cold - from the door. I mean a wage that will allow people to pay rent or mortgage, and afford to travel to work, feed their families and heat their homes, with a little left for fun. A wage that gives people dignity. That means not having to rely on food banks. That means children not going to school hungry, or in ill-fitting shoes, or without a winter coat. That can’t be too much to ask.
But employers simply can’t afford it. Councils are far too stretched. So is the NHS. And in the private sector, to pay staff more, small business owners need to put their prices up. Which raises inflation. Which means wages need to go up again.
I’m no economist, but what I don’t see is any form of leadership at the helm of this “great” country.
In Westminster, the choice between Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak is not one I have any say in – despite the media saturation of their desperate campaigns to undermine each other.
But I can’t hear either of them taking responsibility for, or coming up with any solutions to this bloody, desperate mess.
In Holyrood, the blaming of anyone but themselves for the shambles of our health and education – both devolved – means I’m losing faith.
The mess of our streets is merely a surface-level symptom of a much deeper ill.
