PROPOSALS that would have seen blue landfill bins collected every four weeks have been consigned to the rubbish dump.

Fife Council will now stop their trial runs in the Glenrothes area and ditch the controversial idea completely after disappointing results.

Although recycling levels increased slightly and the waste going to landfill dropped, the new arrangements were too costly and led to an increase in contamination in the green (cans and plastics) bin.

Confirmation came last week and Ken Gourlay, head of assets, transportation and environment, said: "The results from the trials and the change in circumstances around national policy and markets since the trials started do not support the rollout of either trial Fife-wide."

However, councillors did back moves to collect the brown bin (food and garden waste) every four weeks in the winter, starting in December.

The trials, which started in 2015, included the blue bin being collected every 28 days and provoked a storm of opposition and national interest.

The hope was change would help save £1m a year and boost recycling figures but critics said it was "like going back to Victorian times" and were concerned about overflowing bins full of four-week old waste, such as used nappies.

They were also concerned about the stench from the garbage attracting vermin and two petitions against the scheme – neither was submitted to the council – were started.

Mr Gourlay's report said that "neither trial realised the level of financial savings" but he added: "A large amount of very useful data was obtained by running the trials, including data on the levels of contamination in bins and the common contaminant materials in each bin.

"In addition it has shown that despite implementing the trial services, the fact remains that over 50 per cent of the contents of landfill bins should be recycled either at the kerbside or at recycling points or centres."

The proposals were officially dropped at last Thursday's environment, protective services and community safety committee and all households will revert to the standard four bin service.

Higher than expected costs was among the main reasons and Mr Gourlay said: "This included higher levels of staff to support householders, and the need to purchase a higher number of larger landfill bins for those requiring extra help due to medical or household size and for those that couldn’t go onto the trial service, such as flatted properties."

Councillors were told that external factors had also had an impact, including the Scottish Government's intention to introduce a deposit return scheme for bottles and cans and the National Recycling Charter.

Fife signed up to the charter in 2016 but must meet the criteria – which includes changes to what waste they currently accept in the green and grey bins – to ensure future government funding.

Mr Gourlay said China's recent decision to severely restrict imports of waste plastics and unsorted paper and cardboard, a large proportion of all UK material was sent there, would also have repercussions.