Wiltshire Council tackling 'blight' of litter across the county

A new 'Don't Mess with Wiltshire' campaign has been launched

Author: Aaron HarperPublished 29th Jan 2024

A campaign's been launched in Wiltshire to tackle the growing issue of littering.

Wiltshire Council's 'Don't Mess with Wiltshire' campaign will focus on littering in towns and parishes as well as hotspots such as laybys and on main roads.

The campaign will be seen through the media, on buses, as social media posters and on-demand TV.

It will also see more enforcement of littering offences through investment of new CCTV cameras around laybys and on main roads, with this supplemented by the addition of new officers to prosecute persistent littering, along with more community litter collections, litter picks on main roads, plus educational resources to encourage behaviour change.

It follows a campaign targeting fly-tippers in the county during 2023.

"It's a blight on our beautiful county," Cllr Caroline Thomas told Greatest Hits Radio. "In addition to being a blight for us to look at, it's also it's also very bad for the environment and for the nature that lives within that environment."

Cllr Thomas, who is Cabinet Member for Transport, Street Scene and Flooding, told us it costs £1.5 million to deal with litter every year, something that could be spent in a more meaningful way.

"We could be taking better care of some of our most vulnerable people in society, (through adult social care), we could fill in a few more potholes and the damage to the verges of the roads," she said.

And while Cllr Thomas recognises for most of us it's just a nudge and a reminder to take our rubbish home with us or to make sure we find a bin, but there's still a lot of people who do, and it's them the council are aiming at changing the behaviour of.

She was also full of praise for the community groups around Wiltshire who've been taking it upon themselves to clean up our county, giving up almost a thousand hours as volunteers.

"They've collected over 7,500kg of litter in 2023, that's about 1270 bags," said Cllr Thomas, "It's just fantastic, a big, big thank you to them."

To report high volumes of litter in Wiltshire or to find out more about the campaign and how to get involved in a community litter pick, people should visit www.wiltshire.gov.uk/litter.

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