Litter / Littering

Listening to RadioWM yesterday it was reported that a councillor witnessed a van driver in Wolverhampton drop a chocolate wrapper out of his van window. The case was taken to magistrates court where the accused claimed that as he is a type 2 diabetic he is unable to eat chocolate. The magistrates in their wisdom????? agreed and discharged the van driver. I am also a type 2 and I frequently eat chocolate. What made the situation even more bizarre was that the councillor claimed that he followed the van for several miles FILMING THE VAN WITH HIS MOBILE PHONE in the hope that more wrappers would be dropped, there was no comment by the magistrates about that. Les

I'm sure all of us of a certain age will remember the long running "Keep Britain Tidy" campaign of the 50s and 60s. I'm also sure the message was drummed into our generation because it does seem to be mainly the "throwaway" generation that casually toss aside their garbage. I'm lucky enough to live in a rural area but it's common to see fastfood bags full of food scraps and wrappers on the roads after some citizen has thrown them from a car, or supermarket bags full of rubbish thrown onto grass verges. Those large cartons of so called milkshake make quite a mess too. Not long ago I noticed a car outside my house but thought little of it. When I went outside a little later I found a steaming nappy in the gutter! It was obviously more convenient for these charmers to inconvenience someone else. There seems to be an absence of regard for others nowadays. Perhaps we should all lobby the powers that be to restart the "Keep Britain Tidy" campaign on children's TV. They might also have a word with the bin men, the idea is to empty the bins INTO the cart! Rant over.

I said I wanted to have a look at some old footage of the shopping area to see what the litter situation was like then, plus it was a good excuse to put this on cos it's one of my favourites, not much litter, no-one eating and walking, no rubbish lying by the communal seats. Precinct and litter Oh forgot, put it on full screen.

The UK is a filthy country. When I come back from some parts of Europe, I notice straight away how dirty the UK is (although some European countries have different problems, especially with graffiti!) I work at Walsgrave, not far from Tesco, and the amount of litter discarded alongside the dual carriageway is unbelievable. The wooded area alongside Tesco is absolutely filthy. Bags of used nappies, bottles, food containers, etc. When I lived in Stoke we used to regularly find discarded junk food wrappers in our garden. Ball Hill is so dirty now it depresses me even driving through it. When we moved to Earlsdon it was so clean. Now it's just as bad some days, with discarded wrappers and beer cans. I've seen people throw litter from car windows, especially smokers. Absolutely vile. What annoys me is that the source of most of this litter is obvious, yet they just wash their hands of it. We lived just far away from the junk food stores in Stoke to mean that by the time they reached our house they'd finished and wanted somewhere to throw it.

Just spotted this topic. Litter is my pet hate. Coventry nowadays is a filthy city, apart from the posher areas!! Some 35 years ago I worked for Cov Council on the street cleaning & most areas were swept either weekly or daily, usually manually by a proper road sweeper (a human, not a machine that does a very poor job). Now though, I think because our Councillors get paid such high wages, we can't afford to keep Coventry clean. Hillfields was once swept every day on the main roads like Harnall Lane. I know 'cause I was one of those that did it. I won't say exactly where I live in Wyken, but I go out every evening & most afternoons with several carrier bags or black bin bags & spend over an hour each time picking up litter in my area. Because I live near a school & shops it's worse. People sometimes ask what I'm doing picking up litter, but I just hate it. The problem is, there's no real deterrent. If we were like Singapore where you can be jailed or beaten for dropping litter, people would think twice. We could stop it tomorrow like most crimes or misdemeanours, if people were properly punished, but we are too "soft" & fine them a paltry sum (look at how many people still use their phones while driving). That's because they risk having to pay a £60 fine if they are unlucky enough to be caught. If we banned them from driving (like drink-drivers), they wouldn't risk using their mobiles. But this is too simple a solution for our "wonderful Government". I don't think common sense is on the curriculum at Eton, is it?

I know how you feel Doug, you can claim 5 cents per can or bottle over South Australia for your empties but nothing anywhere else. So where is the incentive to save your empties here? Most annoying when driving along and seeing the roadsides trashed.

I have just read the 'littering' topic in Dutchman's latest link. I can't imagine anyone taking their garbage bin and emptying it out in a public area. I am a great believer in 'name and shame', I don't care who it is, examples have to be set these days with so much litter around. (Sorry if this is whinging)

If that's whinging Dreamtime you can add me to the list of whingers. It's high time people showed some respect for their communities. Further more we ALL have to pay to clean it up.

I once asked someone who deliberately threw an empty can on the pavement if they would mind putting it in a nearby litter bin. Luckily for me they picked it up and put it in the bin.

Good on you Tricia, whoever it was could have turned nasty, obviously they knew they were doing wrong. You must feel very strongly about it to have been so bold.

The House of Lords have recently been discussing this subject, how filthy the UK is compared with Europe, speaking about France was an example which I agree with, as I've been to France myself years ago, it was spotless, even the grass verges kept short even in the countryside. The Lords are going to try to stop it all, not by small fines either, big fines especially anyone throwing rubbish from a car, the driver will be heavily fined, as he stated down in Oxford where he lives the rubbish in his lane, his neighbour David Cameron has noticed it too. One Lord stated how most walk around the towns oblivious of what is around them, talking on their phones or earpieces in their ears and want to find a way to stop them so they can see what is around them. My thought on that one, some know what's around them so they shut off and tune into a different world, as for the rest it's like everything else, they have no respect for their own place to which they live. The Lords themselves admitted when they were young it wasn't like it. I feel for the wildlife myself.

Also during the IRA bombing campaign a lot of litter bins were removed as bombs were being placed in them. Many people will use a bin, but won't take their litter home with them. Of course there is the attitude that my little piece won't make any difference.

The countryside may be tidy, and I think the majority of the UK country side is too, but have you ever been to smelly, dirty, horrible Paris???? There's nowhere I know of in this country quite like it - and Brussels runs it a close second I find the German cities, like Berlin, Munich, Cologne, much more acceptable, and on a par with London and other cities in this country What I would like to see outlawed are the dropping of chewing gum and spitting

Midland Red The countryside may be tidy also France being smelly dirty,