The Daily Mail today once more calls on public-spirited readers to join the fight against the blight of litter.
More than half a million volunteers signed up for the Great British Spring Clean last year – clearing streets, parks, beaches, and countryside.
Organized with Keep Britain Tidy, the eco-friendly campaign was a huge success with 17,097 organized clean-ups collecting 957,377 bags of rubbish between them. It is thought to have been the biggest-ever environmental action carried out in the UK.
This year we aim to make it even larger by enlisting up to a million volunteers for events running from March 20 to April 13.
Some experts have already been drafted in – with the Wombles coming out of hibernation to help reach our goal. Orinoco was pictured with Boris Johnson for the campaign’s official launch.
As the Mail asks YOU to join our inspirational litter clean-up… look who’s come back to help! (Womble Orinoco meets Prime Minister Boris Johnson at the House of Commons this week)
The Prime Minister said: ‘Litter blights our communities, spoils our countryside, and harms wildlife. Campaigns like these make a big difference to our planet and help ensure the UK’s beautiful countryside is preserved for generations to come.
‘I applaud the Daily Mail and Keep Britain Tidy for calling on communities to come together and join the fight against litter.’
It is hoped the Wombles of Wimbledon Common will inspire a new generation to roll up their sleeves and clean up the things that ‘everyday folks leave behind’. Readers can take part in organized spring-cleaning events – or start their own, either as a group or solo.
Allison Ogden-Newton, chief executive of Keep Britain Tidy, said: ‘The Great British Spring Clean is now an institution and one we are very proud of at Keep Britain Tidy.
‘We are absolutely fixated on making litter-picking a sport, something every community can get involved with. The Wombles are back because we need them as never before. Many of our volunteers identify with and even call themselves Wombles so, for them and for us, it is great to have the Wombles coming out of hibernation.
‘Our environment is under threat from the waste that we produce and litter being chucked into the natural world, and we all have a part to play in reversing that damage.’
Fiona Nicholls, the plastics campaigner for Greenpeace UK, said: ‘The hard work and people power it takes to clear the litter from a local park or beach is amazing. People are trying to do their bit… businesses and the Government must do the same, by setting plastic reduction targets to end the scourge of plastic pollution and to stop plastic fuelling the climate crisis.’
The Daily Mail has mounted a series of landmark environmental campaigns including Turn the Tide on Plastic, Be a Tree Angel, and Curb the Cups. This newspaper also successfully pressed for the plastic bag levy that has slashed the number going to landfill and generated millions for charity.
Join us – and we’ll clean up! 563,163 volunteers joined our campaign last year to clean up the litter blighting Britain. We can do even better in 2020 – and it couldn’t be easier to take part (just ask a Womble!)
Whatever you have planned this weekend, you are likely to come across discarded litter. On country walks, it’s the depressing sight of crisp packets in the hedgerows or discarded dog poo bags up in the trees.
Visit a beach and you’ll doubtless come across tangled clumps of bottles and broken plastic washed up on the sand.
On car trips, it’s impossible to avoid those eyesore verges and lay-bys strewn with unwanted cartons, cans, plastic bags and wrappers thrown out of windows.
But for every thoughtless litter lout, there are countless others who want a cleaner outlook on life. Today, with the backing of the Daily Mail, Keep Britain Tidy launches this year’s Great British Spring Clean and it is set to be bigger than ever before.
Amazingly, 563,163 volunteers joined our campaign last year to clean up the litter blighting Britain. We can do even better in 2020 – and it couldn’t be easier to take part (just ask a Womble!)
Last year, an astonishing 563,163 volunteers pledged to help – the biggest ever mass-participation environmental campaign – clearing parks, beaches, streets and common land of the equivalent of 239,344 wheelie bins full of rubbish – nearly 20 percent of which were plastic bottles which were recycled.
At 17,097 events across England, Wales and Scotland, our readers collected almost a million bags of rubbish (957,377 to be precise) – that’s 4,308 tonnes of litter that would have blighted our open spaces, potentially harming wildlife. More than 270 local authorities got involved, and the campaign was publicly backed by 89 MPs.
In fact, the campaign was referenced four times in the House of Commons and another four times in the Lords.
Now, the challenge is to make even more of an impact this year.
Again, everyone involved will be encouraged to separate plastic to be recycled.
Even if you live hundreds of miles from the nearest beach, your efforts will help protect the world’s oceans from the scourge of plastic trash. It’s estimated that 80 percent of the plastic in our seas originated on land.
That’s because, wherever you live, inland plastic is blown into rivers and out to sea on a windy day. When it rains heavily, the rubbish littering the gutters is washed into storm drains or overflowing sewers, eventually making its way into the ocean.
Flash mob: Youngsters on Chesil Beach, Dorset, celebrate after successfully removing plastic pollution from the coastline
Globally, rivers carry more than two million tonnes of plastic into the sea every year. And as we now know, the world’s oceans simply cannot cope. But if you join The Great British Spring Clean between March 20 and April 13 this year, you can be confident you will be reducing that burden. Let’s rally a million volunteers to give Britain the biggest spring clean yet.
More than 150 councils are already on board, agreeing to supply or lend equipment and arrange for safe disposal and effective recycling.