I AM replying to Oxford City Council street scenes manager David Walker's comment about flytipping being “a British disease” that “wouldn’t happen on the continent” (Monday’s Oxford Mail).

I go to Menorca a few times a year, and there the vans come to pick up rubbish every night. You can put anything out (even mattresses, cookers or sofas) and they will take it.

Here, I have eight different bins around my house – so many I sometimes get confused about which one to put out and when, as they are only collected once a fortnight. My husband has to go to Redbridge tip at least twice a month.

The council deserves all the criticism it gets for the service we council tax payers are getting.

As for picking up big items, I asked them to pick up a mattress once and had it sitting outside my house for two weeks – despite making numerous phone calls.

I have a compost bin, so recycle my garden rubbish, and am not against helping the environment. But isn’t it about time the council realised that having all these bins isn’t working?

Pauline Holden, Kiln Lane, Headington, Oxford