SOUTHAMPTON councillors have just one day left to change their minds over plans to revamp the city's system of rubbish collection.

But on the eve of the decisive full council meeting tomorrow - which decides the future of waste collection in Southampton - city bosses are sticking to their guns.

The city's ruling Liberal Democrat group say they are determined to push through radical plans to move to a once-a-fortnight collection of household waste.

On alternate weeks binmen will pick up recyclable waste such as cardboard and plastics.

Polls conducted by the Daily Echo and by polling organisation MORI are also at loggerheads.

City environment bosses are claiming that more than two-thirds of people in Southampton are in favour of controversial council plans to radically overhaul waste collection in the city following a £7,000 MORI poll conducted last week.

But a Daily Echo poll, conducted over the weekend and yesterday, which quizzed 1,000 residents across the city, found a staggering 844 people opposed to the council's plans to introduce fortnightly household rubbish collections, with only 156 in favour of the proposals.

Our poll asked residents a simple question once we had established if they lived in the city.

We asked "Are you in favour of Southampton City Council's plan to move to a fortnightly collection of domestic and recyclable waste?"

We conducted our poll in the city centre, Millbrook, Bitterne, Shirley, Thornhill and Lordshill. And 84 per cent of people were opposed to the council's plans.

Our poll comes after a telephone poll which we conducted last week which found over 90 per cent of people against the City Council's proposals.

The council's poll, commissioned by the Liberal Democrat group, was conducted by independent polling organisation MORI.

The survey found 67 percent of people are in favour of the so-called "twin bin" scheme where household waste is collected once a fortnight with recyclable waste collected on alternate weeks.

The poll, conducted last week, found 25 per cent of residents are strongly in favour of the scheme with 19 per cent being "slightly in favour." Only 21 per cent were strongly against.

When the scheme was explained to residents, the figure leapt from 25 percent "strongly in favour" to 45 per cent. Those "slightly in favour" rose from 19 per cent to 23 percent with the "strongly against" figure dropping from 21 per cent to just 17 per cent.

A total of 1,000 residents were sampled by MORI, who also wrote the questions.

In answer to a separate question in the MORI survey about the ease of sorting rubbish from recyclable material into separate bins, 79 per cent said they would find it very or fairly easy and a similar number said they would adapt quickly, and 81 per cent of people said they would recycle more material than at present.

Councillor Jill Baston, Cabinet member for environment and transport, said: "It is important that we have an impartial and accurate figure - of what Southampton people think.

"Other surveys have been carried out in recent weeks which have misled and have been full of flaws. That's why these independent and properly researched findings are so important.

"It's clear that most people support the council and its objective of improving recycling and the environment through alternate weekly collections.

"Of course we will listen to anyone who has problems - whether there is an overall objection and we can try to address that, or whether individuals have difficulties we can assist them with. That is the sign of a good council, and we will be monitoring and reviewing the scheme in light of this experience.

"But the city has spoken and we intend to implement the scheme most residents favour."

But the poll findings were dismissed as "flawed" by Conservative group deputy leader Councillor Royston Smith.

He said: "This is a skewed result because they were not asking the right questions."

Labour group leader Councillor June Bridle was also dismissive of the MORI poll results.

She said: "There has to be considerable doubt about the way people were questioned. I don't doubt MORI but it is the way the questions were asked."

The controversial plans by the city council would see household waste collected once a fortnight with recyclable waste such as plastic, cans and cardboard collected on alternate weeks.

More than 1,000 residents have already signed-up to our Daily Echo "What a Waste" campaign, which is urging the council to change its mind and retain a once-a-week collection of household waste as well as a separate collection of recyclable waste.

In tomorrow's Daily Echo, we will be publishing the grand total of people who have signed our "What a Waste" petition on the day the council stages its crunch debate on the issue.