WEST Somerset residents could soon have to hang on to their rubbish for an extra week if plans to sign up to an umbrella organisation known as the Somerset Waste Partnership go ahead. The district will be expected to fall in line with other areas which already operate a fortnightly refuse collection in a bid to boost recycling figures. West Somerset Council is currently in discussion with partnership members Somerset County Council and the county's four other district authorities, with a view to forming a single organisation to deliver the entire county's waste and recycling services. The cost of signing up should be known in a matter of months, with a final decision on the future of the partnership due to be taken in April next year. West Somerset Council's cabinet members were told on Monday that there still issues which needed to be resolved before a final decision on whether to stay in or opt out was taken. These included costs, the impact of increased recycling targets, the style and location of customer services and the future provision of street and toilet cleaning. Corporate director Adrian Dyer said the partnership also offered the opportunity to "harmonise" service delivery by encouraging all members to adopt the 'Sort It!' collection scheme. Already operational in parts of Taunton Deane and Mendip, the scheme involved a weekly kerbside collection of recyclables and alternate weekly collections of garden and general waste. The weekly recycling collection would be expanded to include kitchen waste for composting, while plans were in the pipeline to expand the scheme even further to 'Sort It! Plus' which would see plastic and cardboard also collected from the kerbside. Mr Dyer told councillors recycling rates had shot up in areas where the fortnightly rubbish collection had been introduced, with householders restricted to using wheelie bins provided by their local authority for the disposal of their waste. But the idea of dropping the current weekly refuse collection and forcing people to use wheelie bins instead of bin bags caused concern among some councillors. Cllr Keith Ross said many of the district's residents were elderly and would struggle to cope with wheelie bins, while Cllr Bryan Leaker raised doubts about the entire scheme. He said: "One minute we are saying we are customer focused but then we're telling people to hang on to their rubbish for two weeks. "The reason we're being given is to encourage recycling, but there must be a significant cost reduction - if there isn't I'd want to know why not. "I am extremely sceptical about this." Mr Dyer said trade and business waste would continue to be collected on a weekly basis and warned that if recycling figures did not increase, taxpayers would be financially penalised by the Government in later years. "We have to educate customers about this. I am sure that will be a lot of elderly residents who will not understand this," Cllr Tony Knight said. Councillors had previously been told that signing up to the partnership should save the authority money, with shared savings of some £1 million being anticipated across all of the six partnership members.