The secret war waged by Brighton's ‘insurgent' bin men

Telegraph

5 days ago

Slashed tyres, death threats and a cache of weapons. It sounds like the opening scene of a gangland crime thriller – but it is actually part of a decades-long war over Brighton's bins.
The row has boiled over in the last 18 months, with council bosses accusing a group of insurgent refuse workers of 'bully boy tactics' in a 'toxic' environment in which they claim culprits are protected by the GMB union.
Vehicles at the Brighton and Hove city council-run waste disposal site have been repeatedly 'sabotaged', according to a May 15 council report, with the council claiming wires were cut on at least two.
It's a plot reminiscent of the Sopranos, in which the fictional mob boss Tony Soprano runs a waste management business as a cover for his mafia earnings.
The chaos has left locals with no idea whether their waste will be taken, with haphazard collections leaving weeks of rubbish piling up.
When The Telegraph visited the coastal East Sussex city in May, six weeks' worth of discarded bottles and four weeks' worth of recycling had been left untouched.
In one troubled area, Patcham, resident John Ellis, 65, said problems with collections had been 'on and off over the last 15 years'.
Gesturing to a pile of rubbish outside his front door, he said: 'The collections, especially for recycling, are really poor, and it's quite dangerous because we have glass bottles out on the streets as well.
'If you go further into the city, there's a real problem, because the seagulls will come down, especially if it's a plastic bin bag, and hack the bags open to find any food that's left over… it makes a real mess. We're all paying our council tax, of course.'
This month, the council blamed a missed collection in Patcham on 'a problem with the vehicle'.
It was not confirmed whether the lorry was the target of sabotage.
Across Brighton, the number of missed bin collections more than doubled from 573 to 1,369 between December 2024 and April 2025.
Meanwhile, the Labour-run council has announced a 4.99 per cent rise in council tax bills this year – the maximum increase allowed without a referendum.
It would take take the average band D council tax bill to £2,455, more than £200 a month higher than the previous year.
The latest round of delayed collections followed years of disorder at the bin depot.
A cache of knives, nunchucks, baseball bats and a samurai sword was found in 2023 at the Hollingdean bin depot in the north of the city, inside an office.
A subsequent three-month investigation ordered by the council, and carried out by Aileen McColgan KC, found instances of bullying, intimidation, racism, sexism and homophobia across the site.
One witness said the environment was 'like Animal Farm', George Orwell's 1945 satirical novella featuring farm animals revolting against their farmer owner.
And the investigation alleged many problems at the depot stemmed from the trade union members' 'pecking order'.
The longest-serving lorry drivers were at the 'top table', and therefore protected by the union, while others were left to fend for themselves, witnesses claimed.
Some members threatened to stab other binmen, and brought weapons into the depot to show them to staff, while others sexually harassed female staff and managers, the 2023 report claimed.
In the wake of the investigation, 40 workers left the depot.
Since then, council bosses have invested nearly a million pounds, along with £3.875 million into a new food waste collection. In a rebrand, it changed its name from 'City Clean' to 'Environmental Services'.
Yet two years later, council bosses have reported more acts of sabotage – including the slashing of disciplinary managers' tyres, alongside 'ongoing intimidatory acts both in the workplace and at managers' homes'.
A death threat was made against a manager at the site as recently as January this year.
Staff members are still suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, according to the report published in May this year.
It added: 'The council is determined to deliver a waste collection service that the city can be proud of and is taking actions in all areas of the service to address deep-rooted issues that have existed for many decades.'
At the beginning of this month, council leader Bella Sankey claimed the reason for missed bin collections across Brighton was ongoing insurgence at the depot.
She said: 'We will not be held to ransom any more in this city by this small group of individuals. We are on it, we are working with the police, there are investigations going on. They know who they are and they're not going to get away with it any longer.'
She told The Telegraph the 2023 insurgents were 'either GMB Sussex branch reps, or said to have been protected by GMB Sussex branch reps within the council'.
Of the latest report, she added: 'Over the last 18 months, as we have continued taking the necessary action to change this culture, we have seen direct sabotage of vehicles, threats to life, intimidation and a continuation of the same bully boy tactics. This includes a depot manager's car tyres being slashed.'
Gavin Davies, GMB regional secretary, told The Telegraph: 'It's GMB's view that council leaders are seeking to blame a two-year-old report for failures in service rollout, which have worsened since the report, not improved.'
He added that the blame 'needs to lie with the council leadership'.
He said a key issue was the 'millions owed to women employees who have been systematically underpaid over many years', adding: 'It's frustrating our attempts to work with the council on issues such as equal pay keep falling on deaf ears.'
Now many locals are losing patience. Outside 62-year-old Alastair Kerr's home, a month's worth of rubbish awaited collection when The Telegraph visited on May 19.
'When all of us are paying increasing amounts of council tax, it does feel a bit like a kick in the teeth to leave you without any explanation or even an apology,' said the actor, who has lived in Brighton since 2008.
'The council is not easy to communicate with, and you feel like you've been kept at arm's length.'
Peter Goodman, 78, a resident in north Brighton whose recycling has remained uncollected for more than a month, has looked out of his window at an overflowing black bin and a pile of boxes each morning.
'If it gets beyond this, I may actually have to take some over to the tip myself,' he said.
Allister McNair, a conservative councillor for Patcham and Hollingbury, blamed Labour for the problems. 'It doesn't seem to be getting better – the problem seems to be coming back,' he told The Telegraph.
Accusing council bosses of 'taking their eye off the ball', he asked: 'When's the end in sight?'
Mark Earthey, an independent councillor for Rottingdean and West Saltdean, said roads in his ward were sometimes missed for eight weeks at a time.
'I have residents who are partially sighted, or have mobility issues. They've been falling over rubbish and uncollected bins,' he said.
'People can't even get in and out of their own homes because of bins in the road or pathways. It's been total meltdown.'
Sussex Police confirmed it was investigating a series of reported offences linked to a Brighton and Hove council depot in Hollingdean.
A spokesman said the reported offences, which span a period from 2023 to 2025, included criminal damage, possession of offensive weapons, harassment, arson, and further serious offences.
All the incidents reported to Sussex Police remain under continual review and were forming part of a wider investigation that remains ongoing, he added.