PLANS to introduce a charge for Copeland residents to have their garden waste collected have been scrapped.

Copeland Council had proposed a £15-a-year charge for a brown (garden) bin collection, and households would have been asked to opt in or out.

However, after it emerged that 70 per cent of the 139 who responded to a public consultation would be against the charge, the plans were thrown out at a meeting on Tuesday.

Lena Hogg, leader of the Labour group, successfully proposed that the charge be dropped. She said: “It discriminates against those who can’t afford to pay and would increase fly-tipping. It would cause more problems than it would solve.”

Mayor Mike Starkie added: “We’ve made a big push in engaging with the public – and a significant number responded compared to the last budget consultation – and 70 per cent of them said ‘no’ to this charge. Therefore, I’m minded to put it on the back-burner.”

The fortnightly service runs from March to October. It was introduced in 2003 and is provided to 25,680 homes

When it proposed the charge, the council said that it is not obliged to collect garden waste and the charge would have earned it £177,000 a year.