Litter pickers team up in fight against plastic waste

Wellington Town Councillors, community groups and local businesses came together last weekend.

As part of Wellington's commitment to becoming a plastic free community the chair of the Climate Emergency Group, Councillor Paul Davis, organised a litter pick to highlight the amount of waste plastic that doesn’t find its way into the household recycling schemes already operating across Telford & Wrekin.

Supported by Telford & Wrekin Council, existing Street Champions, community groups and businesses the team scoured the streets on Sunday morning to clean up the town and raise awareness amongst residents.

Climate Emergency Working Group Chair, Councillor Paul Davis said: “I’m really pleased to see the desire from the community of Wellington to show their pride for the Town and to work together to reduce unnecessary plastic waste. The commitment from businesses since launching the scheme has been incredible with many more coming on board as word spreads.

"Sunday was the first of our events and it was a big success, providing a great start for Wellington's journey to go PlasticFree.

"Engaging with residents and being able to talk about why getting rid of single-use plastic is important has been a great way to show that individually and as a community, we can make a big difference to reduce, reuse and refill to help keep our borough clean and green!

"We had 30 volunteers out for a couple of hours and collected 20 bags full of litter including eight of just waste plastic, none of which would have ever been recycled.

"I’d like to thank the Little Green Pantry, Wellington Soroptimists The Climate Action Hub, Shropshire Cycle Hub along with fellow Councillors and Jenny Flegg for co-ordinating the industrious Wellington 2nd Cubs."

Regular information about the Climate Emergency Working group and Wellington’s journey to PlasticFree is included the popular residents magazine 'This is our Wellington'. The group will be organising other events later in the year and more information about the PlasticFree scheme can be found online at: sas.org.uk.