Clean Up Britain

Welcome to the Clean Up Britain campaign. We’re a group of individuals who’ve got together with one shared ambition – to rid this country of its rising tide of litter. We will do it by launching a high profile and effective campaign throughout Britain, badgering officialdom into living up to its responsibilities and, most importantly, by educating people not to drop litter in the first place. This will be a long-term challenge about changing many people's attitudes and behaviour towards litter. This won't be easy, but it can be done. Join the Clean Up Britain campaign, and help make our country a better place to live in for all of us!

The Clean Up Britain (CLUB) campaign is a new initiative dedicated to doing something about the plague of litter engulfing Britain. If you haven't noticed it so far, just take a look next time you're walking on a country lane or wandering around town... have a glance at the filthy motorway verges, the plastic bags fluttering in the trees, the fast food wrappers lying in the gutter, and plastic bottles scattered all over our parks and countryside. An estimated 1.3m pieces of litter (CPRE 2008) are thrown from cars every weekend in Britain. Why? The only explanation is that people want to keep their private space clean. But they do it by mucking up the space we all share. It can't go on. The Clean Up Britain campaign is going to do something about it. As a first step, will you sign our pledge? We might not be able to change the world but, together, we can change and clean up Britain's littered landscape.

CLUB will be a sustained and high profile campaign to change the behaviour and attitudes of the many millions of men and women in Britain who drop litter.

This is a people’s revolution to change the way we think about dropping litter. We want to inspire a social change and we’d like you to join us. Let’s just stop trashing Britain.

We aim to make dropping litter as socially unacceptable as drink-driving.

We’re dedicated to creating an anti-litter movement that highlights vividly just how widespread litter has become in Britain and, crucially, we want to prevent it being dropped in the first place.

Countless people all over Britain already give their time freely to pick up other people’s litter. But it shouldn’t be necessary. It costs nothing to put your litter in a bin instead of chucking it onto the street.

Individuals

Let’s be clear. The problem of litter is caused by a significant number of people in Britain. Since the 1960’s the amount of litter dropped in Britain has increased by 500%, to the point where about 2.3 million pieces of litter are dropped every day.

Since nearly half the population admits to dropping litter, we don’t underestimate the scale of the challenge. We recognise that the increasing problem of litter is partly a consequence of the changed pace of life in Britain and a product of the ‘on the go’ lifestyle.

But we can’t go on just throwing wrappers, cans and bottles on the ground - some of them take hundreds of years to biodegrade. The CLUB campaign will also confront the underlying causes of littering.

Companies

Much of the litter that scars Britain’s countryside has been produced by some of our most famous brands – McDonald’s, Coca Cola, Red Bull, Pepsi, Walker’s Crisps, KFC, Cadbury’s, Carlsberg, Mars, Heineken, Starbucks, Imperial Tobacco, GSK, Costa Coffee, Wrigley’s chewing gum and many others.

These are enormously successful companies and they’re a big part of the litter problem – we hope to persuade them to become a big part of the solution.

For instance, recently released research on litter brands in 20 English towns and cities, claims that 14% of all litter is from McDonald's (source: Keep Britain Tidy).

McDonald’s must, we believe, make a much more significant contribution than the £2m a year which the company says it is committing to litter patrols outside its 1100 restaurants in the UK. Last year, McDonald’s enjoyed a record year in its British restaurants, and reported a 9% rise in worldwide after-tax profits to a massive £3.1bn.

We accept, of course, that these companies don’t litter themselves. However, they have a vital role to play in educating their consumers to behave more responsibly, which must extend far beyond putting small and ineffectual “don’t litter” logos on the side of their products.

Local Authorities

It costs nearly £1 billion a year – that’s £1,000,000,000 – to clean up litter in Britain. We can’t afford it! In this age of cuts, it’s madness to be spending precious public money on clearing up litter.

Local councils have a legal obligation to clear litter from public land. They are falling down on the job. Some of them feel that they can’t afford to act, others believe it’s a battle they can’t win….. no matter how quickly litter is cleaned-up, it re-appears.

Prevention is better than cure. That’s why the Clean Up Britain campaign aims to understand why so many people drop litter, and what it’ll take for them to kick the litter habit. It’ll take time. But in the meantime, we’ll actively encourage Councils to impose fines on those who drop litter. Failing to do so suggests that no-one really minds. And we do mind!

Statutory Bodies

Public bodies such as Network Rail and the Highways Agency have a statutory obligation to clean up public spaces that are “visibly degraded” within 60 hours (Environmental Protection Act 1990). Anyone who drives or travels by train in this country can see that they are often failing to act. CLUB will pressure them to discharge their statutory responsibilities.

The huge financial cost to all of us

In 2008/2009 (the last year for which the figures are available) the direct cost to the taxpayer of clearing up litter was £858m - equivalent to nearly £33 for every household in Britain (UK households = 26.3m: ONS 2010). This is money that Councils could have spent improving roads, providing more nursery school places, or looking after elderly people. Yet, even after spending these huge sums of money, the country is still filthy. We will never win the battle against litter until we change people's behaviour.

Reduces crime

It has now been clearly established that the appearance of our environment affects how we behave (Kees Keizer/University of Groningen research). If the streets are covered in litter, people drop more litter. But not only do they see no reason to keep a place clean if it's already dirty, their general behaviour gets worse. In short, a dirty city is, almost invariably, a more dangerous city. Get the towns and cities clean and crime levels can drop.

Danger to animals

Human beings are not the only casualties of a dirty environment. 95% of vets say they have treated animals injured or made ill by litter (ENCAMS), and in 2007 over 69,000 animals were killed or injured by litter (CPRE).

Litter is responsible for the injury and death of thousands of animals each year. Annually, the RSPCA receives over 7,000 phone calls about animals hurt or trapped by litter.

This is likely to be just the tip of the iceberg considering that there are bound to be many incidents in which the RSPCA are not involved – with owners going directly to vets or wildlife which is never found.

All animals - wildlife, farm animals and pets - are affected by discarded litter.

The following are just some of the preventable incidents that the RSPCA has dealt with:

• A fox cub with its head stuck in a dumped wheel hub
• A dog with its tongue caught in a discarded tin can
• A cow with its head stuck in a fly tipped washing machine
• A seal with fishing net caught around its neck
• A hedgehog entangled in a plastic can holder
• A dog that had cut an artery on metal that had been dumped
• A badger cub which got stuck inside a plastic ‘pack ring’ from a pack of beer. As the badger grew the plastic cut so deep that the animal died
• A cat with glass lacerating the footpad of its paw

These animals and others unnecessarily suffer or even die because of glass, fishing tackle, cans, plastic bags, elastic bands, large fly tipped items etc that not been disposed of responsibly.

All of the photos depicting animals (in the Gallery) were supplied by and are copyright of the RSPCA Photo library and we are grateful to the RSPCA for supporting the Clean Up Britain campaign.

To report a mistreated, neglected, injured or distressed animal, call our 24-hour cruelty line on 0300 1234 999.

Respect for beautiful Britain

We live in a beautiful country. Do we really want to trash it?
Any of us who have been lucky enough to travel outside of the UK will realise that, in comparison to many other countries, we live in an exceptionally beautiful, lush and stunning landscape. It's a huge national asset for all of us. Why are we degrading it...? We shouldn't take it for granted. Quite the contrary, we should respect and cherish it.

Obligation as a responsible citizen

All civilised societies have rights and responsibilities. In Britain, we enjoy a high degree of personal freedom. But we also have certain responsibilities and obligations beyond paying taxes. As a responsible citizen, it's incumbent upon all of us to behave with respect to others... and that should also apply to the environment we live in. Let's not forget: it costs nothing, for anyone, to put litter in a bin.

More enjoyable living in a green and pleasant land

This seems so blindingly obvious that it hardly needs saying. Wouldn't everyone rather live in a clean and attractive local environment rather that one covered in litter...?

Threat to tourism

In comparison to other major European countries, Britain is filthy. We seem to lack pride in our country and if we don't care about it, why should anyone else? This is a dangerous attitude for a country that relies on tourism to support over 2.6m jobs and generating £115bn towards the British economy.

In 2010 it cost Britain not far short of £1 billion to clean up litter. And still the country is filthy! This money would pay for:

42,500 new police constables (starting salary £23,500)

60,000 new nurses (starting salary £17,000)

2,500,000 hospital beds (at £400 a day)

5,000 libraries (£200,000 a year)

Nearly 300 million meals on wheels for pensioners (285,714,286 at £3.50)

Tuition fees for 111,111 students (tuition fees at £9,000)

40 new secondary schools (£25 million to build)

• Picking up litter cost Local Authorities nearly £1 billion in 2010 (Clean Up Britain national campaign)
• The amount of litter dropped in Britain has increased by 500% since the 1960s (KBT)
• An estimated 1.3m pieces of litter are dropped on Britain's roads every weekend (KBT)
• On average, men drop three times as much litter as women (Symphony Environmental survey)
• McDonald's is the most littered fast food brand in England (KBT 2009)
• Coca Cola accounts for nearly 5% of all litter (Litter Heroes survey)
• 300,000 pieces of chewing gum were recently peeled off Oxford Street in London (KBT)
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• Removing chewing gum costs London £10m a year (KBT)
• Westminster City Council spends £100,000 a year removing chewing gum from its streets (WCC)
• 95% of vets say they have treated animals injured by litter (ENCAMS)
• Over 7,000 animals were treated due to litter-related injuries in 2009 (RSPCA)
• 42% of smokers think it is acceptable to drop cigarette butts as litter (Policy Exchange Report: Litterbugs 2009)
• 700,000 bags of litter are dumped on Britain's motorways each year (Chris Mole, MP - House of Commons Debate 2010)
• There is only a 1 in 600 chance of being prosecuted for fly-tipping (CPRE)
• 75% of people think roadside litter is a serious problem (AA)
• 94% of people think that roadside litter gives a bad impression of Britain (AA)
• 76% of people think there should be government campaigns about litter (AA)

• Sign the People's Pledge.
• Set up or join a local 'litter pick' group. If you already belong to a local organisation, please tell us, so we can put people in touch with you.
• Take out a Litter Abatement Order against the Highways Agency. See www.cleanhighways.co.uk/litter-the-law/taking-action
• Send us your photos of litter 'blackspots' and details of where the photos were taken.
• Tell us whether you think it is fair to ask companies whose brands are constantly littered, to make a contribution to the costs of cleaning up litter?