🗞️ EXCLUSIVE: The Chris Mitchell Column: “Rats, Rubbish and a Rotten Denial”
The Lanes Behind Sauchiehall Street Are a Vermin Buffet — And Glasgow City Council’s Looking the Other Way
EXCLUSIVE by Chris Mitchell, GMB Glasgow Convenor
They call them “lanes”. I call them “abandoned lanes with vermin hotels”. A five-star breeding ground for rats — with a buffet on tap and free housing for the filth.
Welcome to the back end of Sauchiehall Lane and Renfrew Lane — running from Charing Cross, stretching down the Pavilion Theatre, and beyond to Buchanan Bus Station. It's not regeneration – it's degeneration. And the rats are loving it.
While the city dresses up the front, the back is collapsing into filth — and no one's taking responsibility.
Behind some of Glasgow’s busiest restaurants and biggest hotels lies a dumping ground so rotten it makes your stomach turn. Bins chewed to bits. Cardboard congealed in puddles of who-knows-what. Bags of waste bursting open. Flies everywhere. The stench? Unbearable.
We’ve handed rats a free buffet and given them homes to breed in. It's like a vermin theme park. And while the rats are thriving, Glasgow’s reputation is rotting.
Glasgow was also ranked the third worst place in the UK for vermin, with council bosses fielding a staggering 13,607 rat-related callouts last year.
THE COUNCIL’S FAVOURITE GAME: PASS THE BUCK
And what do we get from the council? Excuses. Shrugged shoulders. “Private land.” That’s the favourite line now. An open goal for Glasgow City Council to step aside, wash their hands of it, and say, “not our responsibility.”
If there’s waste out front, sure, they’ll deal with it. But step into the lanes? “Nothing to do with us.”
They want to bring in tourist tax. They want to attract visitors, fill up the hotels, sell the city as a cultural capital. But the moment someone looks out their hotel window and sees a rubbish tip? That’s the memory they’ll take home.
BUSINESSES PAYING FOR RUBBISH SERVICE — LITERALLY
Let’s be clear: businesses are choosing who picks up their waste. There’s a competitive market. But cheap doesn’t mean good. And from what I’ve seen in those lanes, the service is an absolute disgrace.
And what are they getting? Nothing. Waste lying for weeks. Overflowing bins. Bins never replaced. Nothing contained. Rodents running wild.
And meanwhile, we’ve got our own first-rate commercial waste team — who wouldn’t leave the place like that. We’d clean it up, no question. But we’re losing out — not because we can’t do the job, but because we actually do the job properly. We wouldn’t get away with it. If it was the council doing this? Fines. Investigations. Questions in Parliament. But somehow, these private waste providers are untouchable. And as a result, we’re facing chaos in the lanes and corridors of the city.
ENFORCEMENT? WHAT ENFORCEMENT?
Here’s the other scandal: no one’s enforcing the rules. The law says waste can’t sit on the street for more than 24 hours. After that, it’s an environmental offence. So where are the fines? Where are the inspections?
We’ve just added 300 cleansing jobs — brilliant. But now it’s time to use them. Send officers into these businesses. Ask them: “How are you getting rid of your rubbish?” If the answer’s a shrug, hit them with a fine — up to five grand. That’ll sort it.
Right now, enforcement’s all bark and no bite. It’s a threat — but nothing ever happens. And Glasgow is suffering for it.
SHOCKING SCENES BEHIND WELL-KNOWN RESTAURANTS
Let’s not kid ourselves — these aren’t abandoned corners of the city. These are lanes directly behind packed restaurants, bars, shops, theatres. Places people visit every day. If the customers saw what was out back, they’d turn on their heels.
Just last week, a restaurant worker told me she was terrified to open the back door — too many rats. A builder working at Charing Cross told me the smell and flies made him gag. The waste had been there for weeks. No one had lifted a finger.
Our night shift workers can enter the lane, but when vehicles pass by and shine their headlights, the rats are absolutely horrifying.
And what makes me really sad is that in some lanes, people are living in the middle of the rubbish. Sleeping in tents surrounded by filth and rats. It’s misery. It’s shameful. It’s heartbreaking.
GLASGOW’S DIRTY SECRET — SPILLING INTO THE MAIN STREETS
And it’s not staying hidden anymore. It’s spilling out. Onto Sauchiehall Street. Tourists, shoppers, locals — everyone’s seeing it. And they’re coming up to me in the street, saying: “Keep going, Chris. We see it. We’re with you.”
This is phase three of cleaning Glasgow up. We fixed the main streets. We’ve got cleansing teams out doing the job properly. But the side lanes? Swept under the carpet. Left to rot. That stops now.
No Excuses. Just Clean It Up.
Don’t tell me it’s private land. Garnethill is heaving with rats. The old O2/ABC site? Swarming. These problems don’t stop at the boundary line. They spread. They multiply. And when the community complains? An email saying it’s “not our problem.” It’s everyone’s problem.
The bins are ancient — lids missing, wheels chewed, split and leaking. You wouldn’t accept that in your street. If the council left waste like this lying in public, they’d fine themselves. So why are private contractors allowed to do it?
"GOTHAM CITY" AND THE REALITY CHECK
Remember when Batman was filming in the city and the council leader said Glasgow looked like Gotham City? Like that was a good thing? Gotham’s a crime-infested cesspit. Is that the image we want?
We’ve got the Commonwealth Games coming next year. Visitors from across the globe. You want them seeing rats crawling over ripped bin bags? Because right now, that’s what they’ll find.
We need every bit of cleansing power this city has — street teams, refuse collectors, commercial waste. Working together. And we need businesses to ditch the waste providers who don’t give a toss, and use the team that actually does the job right — us.
A MESSAGE TO COUNCIL LEADERS: TAKE A WALK WITH ME
To the politicians — get your walking shoes on. Come down these lanes with me. See the misery for yourself.
Enforce the laws. Clean the lanes. Replace the bins. Support the businesses — with real waste solutions, not empty promises.
Susan Aitken, the council leader, said Glasgow needed a “spruce up”? Then why did it take public pressure to get 200 extra cleansing jobs? Because you knew we were right. The public knew we were right. And we’ve got the proof.
We’re not asking for miracles. Just a bit of pride. A bit of backbone. A city that looks after all its streets, not just the glossy bits.
GLASGOW CAN BE GREAT — BUT NOT LIKE THIS
I love this city. I fight for it every single day. I want people to come here and go home saying, “What a place. What a people. What a buzz.”
But right now? They’re saying, “It is dirty.”
Enough is enough.
But if you want to change that? Then start here. Start now. And clean up your act.
There are rats everywhere. I found rat droppings in my close. I am not the only one. There are rats in our backcourt which is "sealed" from the outside world, no open doors (allegedly!), only "closed closes". Why our backcourt? Commercial bins - 6 premises where food waste is regularly left on the ground or the bins are not shut. You would be surprised at the food waste. O ce upon a time, we hung our washing in the back court and sat drinking tea in tbe sun. Now it is a hellhole and nobody does anything about it. A filthy swamp on days like today caused by "acclaimed" restaurants who do not care about vermin or neighbours. GCC agreed to this when commercial premises were told to get their bins off the street. But do not enforce cleanliness. They are a disgrace. Rats bring in disease. There are cities in the dwvelooing world that are cleaner than ours.
For the council to sort the problem they have to accept that there is a problem!! So we need Susan Aitken and co to accept the invitation to see this mess for themselves, the City I love is turning into a tip, this needs action now!!