Bin row helps lift Tories to Birmingham victory

LONDON (Reuters) - A national row over rubbish collection helped the Conservatives to become the biggest party on Birmingham City Council for the first time in nearly 25 years, their local leader said on Friday.

"We've promised to maintain weekly refuse collection ... that resonated with a lot of people," Councillor Mike Whitby, leader of the city's ruling Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, told the BBC.

The Conservatives took 16 of the 40 seats being contested, with Labour taking 13 and the Liberal Democrats 10. The Tories now have 44 of the council's 120 seats.

Many councils in England and Wales have come under fire for switching to a new system of collecting general rubbish and recyclable waste on alternate weeks.

The issue crept up the political agenda during campaigning after newspapers threw their weight behind calls to keep weekly collections.

Local government officials say the move has increased recycling, but opponents complain that leaving rubbish for two weeks is unhygienic and attracts vermin.

Whitby said his pledge to keep weekly collections had proved popular with voters.

"(It) definitely resulted in people coming our way," he said. "We won wards where we've not had Conservatives for almost a decade and a half."

The Daily Mail has launched a "Great Bin Revolt" campaign to lobby the government to reinstate weekly collections. The paper says fortnightly collections encourage vermin, fly-tipping and the burning of rubbish.

Last month, a Local Government Association study said alternate week collections boost recycling by 7 percent, saving councils millions of pounds a year in landfill taxes.