After builders cleaning in Knowsley

Knowsley's Core Strategy says most of Huyton, Kirkby, Prescot, Whiston and Halewood was built from the 1920s onwards, much of it overspill housing for Liverpool, and that the Kirkby and Huyton town centres date mostly from the 1950s and 1960s. Prescot is the old town. At the 2021 Census 43.1% of the borough's 66,073 households lived in semis, 31.5% in terraces, 15.0% in detached houses and 10.1% in flats; 60.3% owned their home and 25.3% rented from a social landlord.

So a typical job here is a semi or a terrace after a new kitchen, a knock-through or a rear extension, with every wall in the room skimmed and the sanding dust carried up the stairs. The crew starts on the door tops, light shades and airing cupboard shelves, works down to skirting and floor, and dusts the ledges again before it leaves.

A 3-bed gutted and replastered throughout usually takes 3 cleaners for 5 hours (£482); a 4-bed detached house after a standard refurbishment is 3 cleaners for 4 hours, £392 all in. Getting plaster dust out of a home has the method room by room.

Knowsley's bulky collection costs £30 for up to five items or £58 for six to ten, on set days by area. It does not take fixtures and fittings: bathroom furniture, internal and external doors and kitchens are all excluded, so a ripped-out kitchen leaves with the builder.

The borough's two household waste recycling centres are on Wilson Road in Huyton (L36 6AD) and Depot Road in Kirkby (L33 7UZ). The Merseyside Recycling and Waste Authority runs both, open 8am to 5pm from October to March and 8am to 8pm from April to September. They take householders' rubble and plasterboard; paint goes to Huyton only, and cement-bonded asbestos is accepted at Huyton by appointment. Arriving in a van of any size, or with a 2 to 3 metre trailer, needs an appointment, with a limit of 12 such visits a year.

Whoever carries the waste away, ask for their Environment Agency registration (a CBDU number) and write down the vehicle details. The council warns that using an unregistered contractor can lead to an unlimited fine. The crew loads no skips and takes no materials, and it needs the rooms clear of them before the clean begins.

The council's monitoring report for 2024/25 counts 556 new homes (461 net), just over half of them affordable, against a plan target of 450 a year. Halewood had 188 completions, Huyton 120 and Kirkby 18, and building continues at East of Halewood, Halsnead Garden Village in Whiston and a former garden centre site in Prescot.

A new house needs a lighter clean: film and labels off the windows, dust out of the units and wardrobes, silicone smears lifted where they will come off. A new 3-bed is usually 2 cleaners for 4 hours, £272 all in. Grout haze across a whole tiled floor is a separate hard floor deep clean at £6 a m², and paint and labels off new windows covers the glazing.