Communities Secretary Eric Pickles has pledged to tackle ‘unsightly bin clutter and ugly wheelie bins’- with forthcoming planning guidance to encourage developers to make provision for waste storage in new homes.

Responding to the announcement, councils, planning authorities and house builders have argued that this is already a key consideration when planning new properties, with one group branding the guidance ‘unnecessary’.

In a press statement, DCLG claims that the guidance will end the ‘daily obstacle course of wheelie bins and recycling boxes clogging up front yards, gardens and driveways’ – which it describes as ‘the neighbourhood scourge of middle England.’

But, according to the Planning Officers’ Society (POS), which represents local authority planning officers, the guidance is ‘unnecessary’.  John Silvester, spokesman for the Society, said: “There is absolutely no need for national guidance on this issue, it flies in the face of localism.”

Labour’s Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and former Environment Secretary Hilary Benn was also critical of the comments, describing the proposed guidance as ‘obvious’.