Communities secretary Eric Pickles has defended his record on getting councils to switch back to weekly bin collections.

In a prickly TV interview yesterday, the former leader of Bradford MDC was challenged by figures that showed 70% of bins were collected fortnightly.

But Mr Pickles said: ‘We have made a very big difference.

‘We’ve protected six million people so they get collection weekly.’

Mr Pickles admitted he could not force councils to reintroduce weekly collections, saying decisions were ‘a matter for local authorities’ and pointing out that bin contracts did not come up on a yearly basis.

He continued: ‘We’ve only been in office a little while. I’ve provided money. What we’ve done is removed the inevitability of fortnightly collection.’