A StokeonTrentLive reader has slammed the council after eight workers were pictured 'standing around doing nothing' at a Stoke-on-Trent tip.

In a letter to The Sentinel, P A Ball, from Bucknall, wrote: "We now have the local tips open at Hanford and Burslem.

"I felt that it was wrong closing them in the first place. Social distancing could have taken place by just letting one or two cars in at a time, that way there wouldn’t have been queues of traffic on the opening days.

"In a photo in The Sentinel on May 15 there is a photo of Hanford tip. On the road outside there are a total of eight workers standing around in hi-vis, no cars in the photo. Why? Why have we got so many standing around doing nothing?

"The next thing the council will be telling us will be the cost of reopening the tips. Let’s just say these are all on the minimum wage which is £8.72.

"Multiply that by eight and it equals £69.76 for every hour they are there."

The tips in the city opened on May 15 with the Hanford site now open every day apart from Mondays and Tuesdays, and the Burslem one open every day apart from Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Both sites now close half an hour earlier to allow for full cleaning of the facilities, so the opening hours are 8am to 4pm for Hanford and 9am to 4pm for Federation Road.