A PUBLIC rubbish tip was forced to make an unscheduled shut down after skips overflowed and people dumped their rubbish in anger and frustration around the site.

Ripon's household rubbish tip in Dallamires Lane shut down on Sunday to avoid what one county councillor called a potential health and safety issue.

Councillor Bernard Bateman, a Ripon member of the county council, said: "It was absolute chaos at one point. The tip was choc-a-bloc with rubbish. When people taking their rubbish couldn't find anywhere to put it, they dumped it on the hard standing."

Coun Bateman said the overflowing problems started just days after Environmental Waste Control (EWC), a Cheshire-based company, had taken over running the tip for the county council.

But when EWC was asked to comment, it said its contracts managing director was not available.

Coun Bateman said the person looking after the tip was keeping it as tidy as possible, but was fighting a losing battle and the only alternative was to close the tip until order could be restored.

He said he understood that the new operators had been unable to secure staff.

A spokesman for North Yorkshire County Council said the Ripon contract had started on Friday.

It had already been decided to close the tip tomorrow to allow new equipment to be installed.

He said that when EWC heard about the problems, four directors visited the site and talked to people waiting to deposit rubbish to explain what was happening.

The spokesman said the council was confident that once equipment had been installed, the public would see considerable improvements.