“In addition to structural measures, we need to start collecting garbage on Sundays now,” proposed the Lisbon coordination group of the IL, in a statement, recalling that the party had already proposed this measure in the municipal assembly, in January 2023, and it was approved.

Currently, garbage collection in Lisbon is carried out from Monday to Saturday, that is, every day except Sundays and holidays.

“The city’s cleanliness has been failing for many years. It failed during the PS/BE executive period and continues to fail now with the PSD/CDS executive period,” stated IL, criticising “the new exchange of accusations” between these political forces, which occurred on Wednesday, during the public meeting of the city council.

For the liberals, the problem of garbage in Lisbon has become “a kind of championship over who had the dirtiest city, when looking at photos from 2007 to the present day.”

On Wednesday, the PS and BE councillors at the Lisbon City Council accused the PSD/CDS-PP leadership of “incompetence” regarding the garbage problem, with the president of the executive, Carlos Moedas (PSD), stating that the situation “was absolutely unacceptable” in the previous municipal administration, under the presidency of the PS.

In charge of Urban Hygiene, councillor Ângelo Pereira (PSD) said that the city's 24 parish councils are responsible for this area, stating that “they receive thousands of euros to remove rubbish from the streets and do not remove the rubbish from the streets”, giving the example of Santa Maria Maior and Benfica, which prompted the reaction of the mayors of these two parishes, both under the presidency of the PS, with the demand for a public apology and the threat of terminating the contract with the council.

Having warned since the beginning of its term (2021-2025) that “the current model of cleaning the city does not work”, IL stressed that “you only have to walk down the street to see”.

In April 2023, the IL municipal group suggested that the council should appoint an external and independent entity to carry out the analysis and diagnosis of problems in the area of urban hygiene so that informed decisions could be made later, but “this proposal was rejected by all those who have so far been unable to solve the problem and are only exchanging accusations”.

“The Liberal Initiative is not satisfied with the situation that Lisbon has reached in terms of urban hygiene. We need to act!”, stressed the party’s local coordination group, defending the need to rethink the model implemented and “solve this problem once and for all”.

The accumulation of rubbish on the streets encourages the appearance of pests and poses a public health problem, stated the IL, highlighting the importance of having rubbish collection every day of the week, to ensure a city without rubbish on the streets.