Christmas and New Year's Day fall on Fridays this year, when Northumberland does not collect. The Monday 28 December bank holiday is the one to watch.
Northumberland County Council has not yet published its Christmas and New Year 2026/27 bin dates. What is already clear is that this year’s calendar is kinder than last year’s. Christmas Day and New Year’s Day both fall on a Friday, and Northumberland’s rounds run Monday to Thursday, so neither day lands on a collection. The one that does is the substitute Boxing Day bank holiday, Monday 28 December.
The quick answer
- 2026 dates are not published yet. Last year the council posted them in mid-December.
- Christmas Day and New Year’s Day are Fridays, which are not collection days in Northumberland.
- Monday 28 December is a bank holiday. If the council treats it as it did on 31 August, that week’s rounds move one day later. It has not confirmed this.
Why this Christmas is different
The bank holidays this year, from GOV.UK:
| Date | Bank holiday |
|---|---|
| Friday 25 December 2026 | Christmas Day |
| Monday 28 December 2026 | Boxing Day (substitute day) |
| Friday 1 January 2027 | New Year’s Day |
Boxing Day itself is a Saturday, so the holiday moves to the Monday. That Monday is the only festive bank holiday this year that falls inside Northumberland’s Monday to Thursday collection week.
How the council handles an ordinary bank holiday is on record. For the Monday 31 August 2026 bank holiday its service alerts page moved every round one day later for the rest of the week: Monday to Tuesday, Tuesday to Wednesday, Wednesday to Thursday and Thursday to Friday. We cover that in more detail on our Northumberland bin days page. Whether the same shift applies in Christmas week is for the council to say, and it has not said it yet.
What happened last Christmas
The council’s 2025 arrangements were on its Christmas opening hours page, captured by the Internet Archive on 18 December 2025. These are last year’s dates, not this year’s:
- Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday collections did not change over Christmas and New Year.
- Thursday 25 December collections took place on Saturday 27 December, two days later.
- Thursday 1 January collections took place on Friday 2 January, one day later.
That page has since been taken down; the council’s website now returns a “page not found” for it. The 2026 version is likely to reappear at the same address, or on the alerts page, in December.
How to check your own dates
The council’s bin collection checker takes a postcode and an address and returns your next collections. Once the Christmas changes are loaded, the checker is the reliable answer for a single house, including any Saturday catch-up.
Garden waste stops before Christmas
The brown bin is not collected over Christmas at all. The council’s 2026 garden waste terms suspend the service from December to February, and the £59 subscription buys up to 20 fortnightly collections between March and November.
Christmas trees and the extra rubbish
The 2025 arrangements gave one route for real Christmas trees: the council said they could go to any household waste recovery centre during normal opening hours, where they are recycled with garden waste.
Those tips close on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day. Both are Fridays this year, which matters more than usual: seven of Northumberland’s twelve tips open only Friday to Monday, so they lose a day in each of the two holiday weekends. The tip page has the full list.
Still to be confirmed
- The 2026/27 revised collection days, expected in December 2026.
- Whether the Monday 28 December bank holiday moves that week’s rounds a day later.
This page will be updated when the council publishes. The Christmas travel page covers trains and buses over the same fortnight, and parking in Northumberland covers the town centre car parks.
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