Bigger rubbish trucks and technology to track missed collections will be part of a new waste contract covering three boroughs.

Maidstone, Swale and Ashford councils make up the Mid Kent Partnership and have been conducting a tendering process for the past 12 months.

The executive members at Maidstone council, the lead member of the group, have agreed to accept a tender from "Bidder A". The name of the firm has yet to be revealed.

The value of the contract is also being kept secret, but in an unusual move, Maidstone council has agreed to purchase the waste collection vehicles itself for the contractor to use – at a cost of £5.8m.

Maidstone council leader David Burton (Con) said the allocation of the contract would be "the biggest single revenue decision within our budget."

But he said purchasing the vehicles directly would reduce the overall cost to the council.

Cllr Martin Round (Con) is the lead member for environmental services. He said in an assessment process, Bidder A had scored 81 points out of 100.

The council had looked at bringing the service in-house, but concluded it would be even more expensive than out-sourcing, partly because of the need to then provide a pension pot for any staff.

Cllr Round highlighted a number of improvements to the service gained under the new contact.

New pod vehicles would be used for food waste and recycling waste, with a bigger capacity.

Although for cost reasons, the new vehicle fleet would stay diesel, the supervisor vans would be electric.

Cllr Round said: "No stone has been left unturned when forging the new contract – we've looked at every conceivable problem."

Cllr Claudine Russell (Con) said: "Customer confidence is key. Everyone knows if their bin has been collected or not."

The new contract will come into force in March 2024.corr

At present, Biffa collects the waste for the three councils.

The contract covers food waste, refuse, dry recycling, garden waste, bulky items and clinical waste.

A deal has been arranged with Demelza Hospice Care, whereby the charity will take some of the items put out for recycling.

Cllr Burton stressed the new contract would make the waste collection more accountable to oversight from the councils.

An improved use of technology would enable requests from customers to the crew to be tracked automatically with missed collections recorded.

The system would also give the councils full access to the vehicle tracking and CCTV systems.

But Cllr Round warned that there was still some way to go before a new deal was signed.

He said: "We now have to complete negotiations with our partners and then hammer out the final conditions with the contractor."

Only two firms showed any interest in the contract, and only one submitted a final tender.