A Harrow politician has slammed the council’s garden waste tax as the most expensive in the country.

Harrow East MP Bob Blackman said that residents were “outraged” by the imposition of the “vexed” tariff last year and, after some research, discovered it was the most expensive such charge in the UK.

“The service is poor, yet the most expensive in the country. It is outrageous,” he said at a parliamentary debate.

According to Mr Blackman, there have been 168 complaints of poor service to date, and 3,080 missed collections out of 128,000 since the service was introduced.

The charge was introduced by the council last year to much public consternation.  

Many people have also pointed to the levy as an aggravating factor in the increased amount of fly-tipping in the area.

However Councillor Graham Henson, responsible for environment, crime and community safety, refuted that, saying: “There is no link between Harrow’s garden waste service and fly-tipping. Fly-tipping is a problem for every local authority - in Harrow it’s domestic waste that we find illegally dumped.

“The council condemns anyone who dumps rubbish illegally in Harrow. We always prosecute those committing environmental crimes where there’s evidence to do so and we’re committing more resources to tackle this problem.”

He added: “Harrow’s garden waste collection service is the most flexible in the country – it operates on a sliding scale and offers great value and choice – people signing up in July paid just £20 to have their garden waste collected through to November.

“Since the start of April we’ve collected 98.8 per cent of all brown bins. When a missed bin is reported to us, we collect it within 48 hours.”