KEEN gardeners across West Oxfordshire are signing up in their droves to have their garden waste collected.

To date, 23,650 licences have been issued to 20,363 properties and councillors are urging people to register to ensure they get the maximum number of collections possible over the coming year.

Carol Reynolds, the cabinet member for environment on West Oxfordshire District Council, said: “We had a successful first 12 months of subscription-only garden waste collections. This year we have had a fantastic response from residents and we can assure them their garden waste will be composted and put to good use.

“The first collection under the new licence will be in April so it is important people register now to take full advantage of it.”

Garden waste collections are undertaken by Ubico, the council’s waste contractor which took over the service in April last year.

The garden waste collection service was previously free in West Oxfordshire but due to the loss of external funding, a small charge was introduced last year.

The subscription-only service starts from the beginning of April and costs £30 per bin a year for fortnightly wheelie-bin collections.

Signing up for garden waste collections can be done at westoxon.gov.uk/garden or by calling 01993 861025.