Scarborough gull strategy prompts calls for faster food recycling

​Coastal councillors have said that changes to food waste collection are vital to establishing an environment where humans and gulls can thrive alongside each other.

North Yorkshire Council is not set to start separate household food waste collections until 2043.

​It comes as plans for a £119,000 urban gull strategy – which includes investment in education campaigns, gull-proof rubbish bags, new and retrofitted litter bins – were backed by members of the Scarborough and Whitby Area Committee.

​“While gulls, in particular Herring Gulls and Kittiwakes are a valued part of coastal biodiversity, their increasing presence in urban areas has led to significant issues including noise, fouling, aggressive behaviour (human/gull contact), and overall public health concerns,” the strategy states.

​Councillors welcomed the “outlawing of some of the barbarous practises that have been used in the past” and a “move into the 21st century”.

​Officers said the strategy was “very much a theoretical document” that would become a “proper action plan”.

​Tim Croot, an officer in the environmental protection team, told councillors that North Yorkshire Council had moved on from “quite draconian interventions such as removing eggs and shooting [gulls]”.

​He added that methods used by the now-defunct Scarborough Borough Council, which included netting and spikes “wasn’t terribly successful”.

​“The strategy from the very outset aimed to try and create some cohesion where we could have co-existence and acceptance of the birds,” he said at the meeting on Friday, June 5.

​“It is their coast as much as it is the humans’ coast, and we need to get to the point of having a strategy in which the actions take account of the needs of the birds as much as the needs of people.”

​The key ‘pillars’ of the new strategy are focused on waste and rubbish, cleaning and jet washing, targeted proofing, and monitoring and planning.

​Cllr Janet Jefferson welcomed the proposal, stating: “This is such a good way forward. I think education is one of the biggest things, because I see people feeding them publicly, and also just dumping their rubbish bags in the street.”

​Councillors said they were concerned that the introduction of weekly food waste collections is not set to start in North Yorkshire until 2043 – while other councils are already required to implement kerbside recycling services – because of an extension granted to NYC due to its existing waste management arrangement.

​Cllr Neil Swannick said: “If you could take the food waste out of the waste stream and stop it being mixed up with other materials, then potentially you could at least deal with a major part of the problem.

“If there was a culture of everyone putting food waste into a separate collection bin, then that removes food waste from the waste site.”

Scarborough Seagull. Courtesy Anttoni Numminen,Ldrs

​Cllr Derek Bastiman agreed that changes to food waste recycling “should form part of this strategy” and seconded Cllr Swannick’s amendment welcoming the gull strategy as well as “suggesting that further work is done to explore the possibility of bringing forward food waste reduction before 2043, including a potential pilot for the coastal area”.

​The costs associated with the strategy include £30,000 on seagull-proof rubbish sacks, £50,000 for jetting, which is based upon the £40,000 spent last year plus inflation and an increase in activity based upon customer feedback.

​The £19,000 for new and retrofitted litter bins relates to the cost of trialling a mix of both new bins and retrofitting additional measures to existing bins, the report states.

​​Meanwhile, £15,000 would go towards education and communication and £5,000 for signage.

​The amendment and recommendations were unanimously endorsed by the Scarborough and Whitby Area Committee.

​A final decision will be made by NYC’s executive committee in August.

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