Storms create almighty mess

Wiltshire councillors, Carole and Gordon King, filled two large plastic bags of rubbish in just over an hour last month, working in the Westbury conservation area of Fore Street and Frogmore Road.

Cllrs Gordon and Carole King explained, “It was a case of trash lined kerbs, rubbish trapped between parked cars with pedestrians walking through it. A lot of discarded rubbish was also collected from around the grounds of the Tesco Express store.

“What had happened is that bags of rubbish had been knocked over and scattered during the high winds that came with the storms the week before. It really looked awful, there was plastic, paper, cardboard and glass, everything that you might expect in a bin; you could see that much of it had been crushed and prepared for disposal. On this occasion, high winds were clearly to blame.

“A little more critically, these bins were put out because collections were made later that day or the next day and what happened clearly occurred prior to the bin collection. If that is indeed the case, it is a great shame that Wiltshire Council’s waste collection contractor left the site without either tidying it, or making any arrangements for cleaning up the mess later. We would suggest that Wiltshire Council makes sure this does not happen again.

“We would also like residents to know that equipment like those we are using is available on request, free of charge, from Westbury Town Council. Together we can make Westbury a pleasant place to live, work and play if we all worked together taking care of our neighbourhoods.

“Waste picked up by residents, litter picking in their street, must be included in your waste for collection at the appropriate time. The litter we picked up today has been added to the waste in our own bin.”