A cabinet member overseeing Barnet Council’s new recycling system says he is “apoplectic” at the news that thousands of bins have still not been distributed.

The local authority introduced its new in-house system on Monday but the firm in charge of delivering more than 330,000 new containers to homes across the borough is yet to complete the job.

Councillor Dean Cohen, the cabinet member for environment, said today SSI Schaefer still has 5,000 bins to deliver to homes that are due to have their first collections on Friday.

The Conservative politician also admitted the new rounds were taking longer than usual due to excess waste, which built up last week when collections were cancelled so staff could be trained in the new system.

Councillor Cohen promised residents who are yet to receive their bins they should be delivered by tomorrow (Thursday), just 24 hours before their collections begin.

He said: “I am very sorry. As you can imagine I am apoplectic with the company that are delivering the bins.

“We have gone through a huge delivery programme over the past month and I am sorry some residents don’t have their bins yet.

“We have now had two days of collections for the service but, with two weeks' recycling to collect and new rounds and crews, these are taking longer than normal.

“However, residents are enthusiastically using their new blue and brown bins, so that looks very positive.”