I am writing in response to a letter in the Gazette on December 11, written by Gill Wood, of Broughton, Malton, about comments made on the radio by John Brown, Ryedale District Council’s environment officer.

Most of what Gill wrote is so true and I would also like to put my point of view regarding the intended charge that Ryedale District Council has introduced for the collection of garden/kitchen waste from June 2014.

This, to me, is a false economy at its worst but it seems if there is a right or wrong way to do something, the powers that be are one of the most consistent and proficient in getting it wrong.

This green waste charge has been tried in other areas and only about a third of the residents have taken up the option of paying. So what are the other two-thirds going to do?

Some people may take their green waste to the council tips and will still incur costs in fuel and time.

Others will put it in the household waste bin, which will end up in landfill.

Mr Brown talked about composting it, but with so many people having more hard surface instead of garden that will not account for the amount that needs to be disposed of, so there is a good chance that fly-tipping will increase and if that is not on private property the council is responsible for the removal of it.

There is talk of putting council tax up next year, so on top of the cost of living going through the roof, people on low incomes in rural areas where cars are not a luxury in most cases, energy bills, food bills are rising faster than income.

This could, in the next election, make a difference to who runs Ryedale Council.

It is almost certain to mean redundancies among the people who do the job of collecting our waste, which again means the taxpayers paying more to support those who lose their jobs so, all in all, it will end up economically unviable – maybe not in the short term, but in the long term.

There is still time to do the right thing and knock this on the head.

There are some councillors that seem to have common sense, so let us hope Ryedale District Council doesn’t just bulldoze this through, like so many other things that they do.

Bob Istead, Rillington