DISABLED pensioner Valerie Ray is desperate to join the recycling revolution - but cannot get the dustmen to take away her bin.But today council officials said they were doing their best to help wheelchair-bound Mrs Ray and were confident they had now worked out a way in which they will be able to empty her blue bin every fortnight.

DISABLED pensioner Valerie Ray is desperate to join the recycling revolution - but cannot get the dustmen to take away her bin.

But today council officials said they were doing their best to help wheelchair-bound Mrs Ray and were confident they had now worked out a way in which they will be able to empty her blue bin every fortnight.

Mrs Ray, 69, cannot pull the bin through her bungalow and it is too heavy for her to go all the way round the back of her property and move it.

She said: “I have asked Suffolk Coastal to take it and they keep saying they will send the men round the back to get it and empty it, but then nothing happens - they keep missing me out.

“I really want to recycle and do my bit but at the moment no-one seems to want to take it away.

“I try my best. I have to carry all my recycling materials on my lap and carefully go out to the bin and flip up the lid to put them in, but it's not easy.

“I just cannot pull it through the house or get it round the back.”

Mrs Ray, who lives at the Reynolds Court sheltered housing complex, off Grange Farm Avenue, Felixstowe, said she was worried about the bin becoming infested with maggots if it remains unemptied.

Most of the other residents of the complex either have spaces set aside for their bins at the front of their property or are able to move them from the back to the front.

The area is the first in Felixstowe to change to the new three-bin system being rolled out across the district over the next few years.

Households have a brown bin for garden and food waste, a blue bin for recycling and a black one for any remaining rubbish.

A spokesman said there had been teething problems with emptying Mrs Ray's bin but the matter would be resolved.

He said: “Any elderly or disabled person who has serious problems putting out their rubbish sacks, or their wheelie bins, can ask Suffolk Coastal Services to be part of their special exemption service which sees the waste management teams collect, and return in the case of the bins, from their property. Over 1,000 properties get this extra service at the moment.”

What do you think of the new three-bin scheme? Write to Your Letters, Evening Star, 30 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich, IP4 1AN, or e-mail EveningStarLetters@eveningstar.co.uk