A PLAN to hand Worcester's bin collections to a private company has moved a step closer - leading to a plea not to ignore the public.

The deputy leader of the city's Labour group has warned the Conservative leadership to get its huge outsourcing project right, calling it "the biggest decision" the authority has ever had to make.

As your Worcester News first revealed last year, the council's administration wants to save taxpayers £500,000 a year by handing bins, park maintenance and street cleaning to a private contractor.

The move is due to launch from September 2017, with a 'high level specification' running to more than 100 pages now being published to market the services to possible providers.

Councillor Joy Squires, Labour's deputy group leader, led the work to scrutinise the project and says she still has concerns over it.

She has argued that a key report into the recent public consultation, which led to nearly 400 responses, was not included as part of the latest paperwork for the Tory leadership to examine at its latest cabinet meeting.

She also said she was disappointed that the only mention of the feedback in the most recent cabinet report was one section saying the council had "considered" people's views.

"This is the biggest decision the council is ever likely to make and it barely gets a mention," she said.

"I am disappointed and think they've missed a trick, far be it from me to say they are paying lip service to it, but I don't feel it's being considered enough."

Fellow Labour Councillor Lynn Denham, speaking during the cabinet meeting, also said she found it "difficult to avoid coming to the conclusion it was only a tick-box exercise" to meet the legal requirements of the law.

The concern was rejected by the cabinet, with Councillor Andy Roberts, the cabinet member for cleaner and greener, saying the consultation feedback had already been poured over once before and was freely available online.

"It was taken to cabinet once before and also went to the scrutiny committee, why we'd want to see it again, I don't know," he said.

David Sutton, the service manager, said he had "no intention whatsoever to disregard or belittle" any of the feedback, and insisted it would be referred to directly during the negotiations with private firms.

Councillor Marc Bayliss, the acting leader, said the "promise" to the public was that the service would be maintained, but added that the consultation process must "inform" the process and not "bind" it.

The consultation saw 388 people take part, with between 92 and 96 per cent calling the three main services either 'very important' or 'important'.

Labour has opposed the outsourcing but the Conservatives claim it will help maintain service standards rather than oversee cuts in-house.

Around 111 in-house jobs will go under the process, with the expectation that most will have their employment transferred over.