Bin workers and recycling staff in South East abused and attacked

Staff at recycling centres and refuse collectors across the South East have been victims of physical and verbal attacks by the public, a BBC investigation has found.One worker has described how a car was used "as a weapon" against colleagues and staff at some sites have been offered body-worn cameras for their protection.There have also been cases of workers being pushed and shoved and hundreds of cases of verbal abuse recorded by councils across the region.Operators said they were taking measures to protect their staff and urged the public to show respect and patience.
Simon Larbey, people development director at Veolia, which operates 10 waste recycling centres in East Sussex and two in Brighton and Hove, told the BBC a serious incident happened within a couple of weeks of him starting work in the county."We had two members of our team run over by a member of the public where the car was used as a weapon, sadly," he said."When the incident was reviewed, unfortunately the CCTV footage we had wasn't enough to get a conviction."
Veolia says it has managed to reduce the number of abuse incidents after teaming up with Sussex Police last year.The company introduced training on how to deal with abuse and staff can wear body-worn cameras for protection."We've seen incidents drop from one a week to one a month; sadly those incidents are still occurring," said Mr Larbey."We see a massive amount of queuing on sites, so unfortunately some of the frustrations the residents feel while queuing - we do see some of those frustrations escalate."
Steven Rowe, Newhaven site manager, said: "Ninety per cent of the public are great, it's only a small percentage who swear at you, you might get the odd one or two with racial slurs."Just remember we're just normal people doing a job, it could be one of your family members, someone you care about and you should think about what you're doing."
Jordan Leaney, the company's household recycling sites manager, said he had been confronted by two people after challenging them about prohibited waste."They followed me up to the office and walked in behind me and locked the door and I had to call my team to get me out," he said.
Freedom of Information requests to local councils revealed there had been over 250 abuse incidents recorded by staff at waste recycling centres in East Sussex and Brighton since March 2020, but no physical assaults.Surrey recorded eight physical attacks at their sites, with 231 cases of verbal abuse between 2020 and 2024.Kent County Council said six physical assaults had been recorded over the five years, and added that staff experienced verbal abuse on a daily basis across the majority of sites.West Sussex County Council could only provide figures for the last two years, but staff reported 27 cases of verbal abuse and three incidents where workers had been pushed or shoved by members of the public.
Amanda Hart, a neighbourhood policing inspector at Sussex Police, said the body-worn technology was helping with evidence gathering."The body cam footage is a really good evidential product, for a jury to see the position that person was put in," she said.
In recent years some authorities, such as Kent County Council, have introduced a booking system to use at the waste sites.David Wimble, cabinet member for the environment at Kent County Council, said: "Having spoken to the workers there, the system works really well."There's nothing worse than people turning up at these sites and having to queue which makes them frustrated."
Refuse collectors also targeted
BBC South East also contacted borough and district councils to find out the levels of abuse directed towards refuse collectors over the last five years.Not all were able to provide a breakdown of incidents. A handful of councils said they had recorded some physical assaults on staff.In Kent, 135 cases of verbal abuse were recorded, in Sussex 196 incidents were logged.
Meanwhile, there are also ongoing concerns about the safety of refuse staff on the roads.Paul Anderson, director of communities at Horsham District Council, said: "Last year two of our crew were out when a car hit both of them. One of the guys has faced life-changing injuries. "One had emptied a bin, the other person was loading a bin into the lorry at the time and the driver just drove into them."
He added: "Often it's about people who haven't got the patience to wait for a refuse lorry to complete its work in their road, and they'll mount a pavement to pass the refuse lorry."We have a number of CCTV cameras inside the cab and outside the vehicle and that allows us to monitor what's happened and we can report that immediately to the police."

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Learn with AIFact CheckingText to SpeechAI Summary

Related Articles

Daily Mail​

4 hours ago

• Daily Mail​

Black student says she was called 'monkey' as she suffered years of racist abuse at £17,000-a-year French private school

A black student has claimed she was called 'monkey' and suffered years of racist abuse at a £17,000-a-year private school in London favoured by the Parisian elite. Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle, in ritzy South Kensington, is run by the Agency for French Education Abroad, with day-to-day supervision overseen by the French embassy in the British capital. The Lycée is the educational establishment of choice for the mostly white Parisian professional class, including senior figures in the worlds of banking, diplomacy and academia, The Times reported. Scattered across multiple locations in London, the school charges fees of up to £16,923 a year for day pupils. Writing in the school's newspaper this week, Gabrielle, a sixth-form pupil described the sustained racism she had experienced while studying there. The teenager alleges that she was called a 'monkey' and told 'it is better to be dyslexic than black' - as well as being exposed to racist jokes on class WhatsApp groups. She also says that white pupils asked black students for an 'N-word pass' - the right to say the racial slur. 'Racism and xenophobia are widespread in all years. Reflecting on my personal experience, I realise that I have always evolved in a school environment where racism persists,' she wrote. Gabrielle claimed that non-black pupils used the N-word 'indiscrimately, whenever they want.' Even more shockingly, she also alleges that racist language was casually deployed by some teachers in a way that likely inspired the pupils to feel comfortable making similar remarks. She claims certain teachers made 'racist and incredibly xenophobic remarks' to non-white pupils, including 'king of the jungle' and 'close to monkey'. She added: 'There may be a correlation between the teachers' crude comments and the behaviour of the pupils, amongst whom there is now a tendency to make derogatory 'jokes' about what they call dirty Arab and black immigrants. 'Monkey insults are also very common towards black children, and some boys go so far as to proclaim that they "don't like black girls". Many justify their comments by labelling them as humour.' The teen says that the 'revolting remarks' over her seven years at the school have 'hurt me a lot' and forced her to 'build a shield for myself'. Her account of racism at the school has reportedly been backed-up by the experiences of parents and other ex-students. The mother of a biracial pupil at the school said the article had been a hot topic among pupils and parents - and that she had heard parents of non-white pupils discuss moving their children to other schools due to the racism directed at them. She blamed Parisian Catholics 'who are quite right-wing' and said they 'probably believe there are too many Arabs and immigrants in France'. The mother said too often systemic racism was dismissed as 'teasing' and that the German-occupation of France during WWII had led to a fear of being deemed a 'snitch'. The Lycée has a number of pupils from French-speaking African countries as well as British children whose families want them to get a bilingual education. The school has produced a number of famous alumni including actresses Jacqueline Bisset and Natasha Richardson. Former Tory MP Dominic Grieve also attended the school, while illustrator Quentin Blake, famous for his work on Roald Dahl's books, was a teacher there. The article was actually authorised by the Lycée's headteacher Catherine Bellus-Ferreira, who as appointed in 2023 and is also the 'director' of the school newspaper. She said she thought the article was 'courageous' and thought it shone the spotlight on a 'real issue'. The headteacher said that it was insufficient for the school to simply say 'we are against dicrimination', adding: 'It is important to me that this school struggles against racism.' She said there has been investigations into around a dozen of the school's 2,000 secondary-school students over the last 12 months. Pupils found guilty of racist behaviour face being suspended for eight days and potentially are required to attend mandatory workshops. Ms Bellus-Ferreira has helped overhaul the school's Ofsted rating after it received an 'inadequate' in 2023 due to 'too many weaknesses in how leaders work to keep pupils safe'. Last year the school was upgraded to 'good' for pastoral care and 'outstanding' for education. Ms Bellus-Ferreira said it would be dishonest to claim there was no instances of racism at the school, but that it was not 'a racist school'. The Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle in London has a main site in South Kensington and three additional primary school sites, in Fulham, Clapham, and Ealing. The school was originally founded near Victoria station in 1915 as the French School of London to take French-speaking refugees from World War I. The school was visited by iconic French president General Charles de Gaulle in 1960 and the institution was subsquently named in his honour in 1980. The French system is facing a challenging time in the classroom, with 16 'serious incidents' reported per 1,000 pupils in 2023-24, according to a report by the education ministry.

BBC News

7 hours ago

• BBC News

Fan who racially abused Wreh banned for three years

A football fan who racially abused non-league striker Chris Wreh has been banned from attending matches for three Dunbar, from Fareham, Hampshire, admitted to sending Wreh a racist direct message from an anonymous Instagram account following Tamworth's FA Cup third-round defeat by Tottenham Hotspur on 12 20-year-old supporter was later found to be behind the social media account by digital investigators and subsequently claimed he had sent the message to Wreh in a moment of anger after losing a bet on the match, which Tottenham won 28-year-old refused to play for National League side Tamworth following the incident. He wrote on X, external two days after the game that he was supported by manager Andy Peaks but was "disappointed" the club did not make a public statement condemning the abuse he had who is the son of former Arsenal player Christopher Wreh, moved to Scunthorpe United on loan in February before signing permanently for National League South side Maidenhead United a month later. 'No place for racism' Senior crown prosecutor Gavin Sumpter said: "Harry Dunbar lost a simple bet, and in a moment of anger, chose to break the law."Dunbar's actions in personally targeting Mr Wreh with such vile and hateful language whilst hiding behind an anonymous account were inexcusable and had a significant impact on the victim."We hope that this case makes it clear to like-minded individuals that such behaviour will not be tolerated. "Individuals who act in this way can expect to be investigated and where there is sufficient evidence prosecuted and banned from attending games."Dunbar was also given a 12-month community order and instructed to carry out 200 hours unpaid work, increased from 150 hours due to the racial element, the Crown Prosecution Service was also ordered to attend 10 rehabilitation days and pay costs of £85.

BBC News

12 hours ago

• BBC News

Fabio Botros: Brighton teen gets date for trial over dad's murder

A trial date has been set for a teenager accused of murdering his father in Botros, 19, was charged in April with the murder of 57-year-old Emad Samir Botros Farag and the attempted murder of a woman and an 11-year-old Crown Court set Botros' 10-day trial for 1 October at a hearing on of Brighton, has not yet entered pleas and will next appear in court on 30 July. The teenager appeared at the hearing via video-link from Hellingly Hospital in East Sussex and spoke to confirm his name. Sussex Police previously said the 11-year-old and the woman were taken to hospital after the incident but soon after discharged. Additional reporting by PA Media.