By Scarlet Drayson
A total of 100 bags of rubbish have been cleared from a Margate play area as part of an ongoing campaign by Margate Women’s Institute.
Seventeen bags of rubbish and other larger items were collected from Tivoli play area by the group during the afternoon of Sunday 14 April.
It was Margate WI’s fifth visit to the green space since August 2023, and in total enough rubbish to fill 100 bin liners, as well as several larger items have been cleared.
Members felt the issue was so serious that they have approached local councillors to see what measures, such as extra bins, could be introduced into the area.
The WI members have been carrying out the voluntary litter picks as part of their ongoing campaign to help keep the town clean and tidy and encourage others to do the same.
At the end of March, the women took part in Keep Britain Tidy’s Great British Spring Clean. As well as clearing 24 bags of rubbish in an organised litter picking session in the Barnes Car Park area in Westbrook, over the two-week campaign the members individually also carried out their own litter picking sessions in their local streets.
View this post on Instagram
Initially pledging to fill 50 bags with rubbish for the campaign, their determination saw them fill 85 bags from areas all over Margate and beyond.
Mandy Jarvis from Margate WI said: “Keep Britain Tidy started from a campaign by the Women’s Institute in 1954. As it is now celebrating 70 years, and our own campaign was inspired by those same women, we just had to take part and help to keep Margate marvellous!
“We had lots of people stop and speak to us as we cleared the streets and parks, and we hope others feel inspired to take steps to protect our environment.”
Margate WI meet at 7.30pm on the second Thursday of every month at Selina Hotel.
We really are a dirty nation
I take my hat off to you ,while you and others keep doing this TDC will let you ,when TDC should put a stop ✋️to this once and for all ,to all littering, on the spot fines, get a firm to enforce this ,local people and day trippers and don’t back down .
sadly i feel they are flogging a dead horse ,its a noble cause but in a few weeks time the rubbish will be back again , you only have to look at our streets , i saw a mattress on a pavement today !
We aren’t a dirty nation. I believe it is a Kent CC and TDC thing. This county is the the most neglected county.I drive all over the UK and there is more litter on our roads and motorways than anywhere else.The weeds,graffiti and roadside turfs are so neglected that some people consider it ok to drop litter.
There have been 2 mattresses on the A299 for 7 months now.My own road has never been swept in the 12 years I have lived here.
I spent 4 days on London Southbank over Easter.There were thousands of people and not a drop of litter.Returning to Thanet was apalling.
“I drive all over the UK and there is more litter on our roads and motorways than anywhere else”
Someone hasn’t driven through sussex, shropshire, lancashire, east midlands.
“I spent 4 days on London Southbank over Easter.There were thousands of people and not a drop of litter.Returning to Thanet was apalling.”
I spend two weekends a month up there skating the undercroft. Its always full of rubbish down there in the evenings that gets blown in off the rivers prom…
I drove from S W London through Surrey,Hants,Wiltshire,Dorset,Somerset and Devon and the roads were very clean.Kent is The Garden Dump of England.
I spent two weeks on a driving holiday in France and saw more litter in the first 200 yards of my return in Dover.
I live off the seafront and weed,litter and litter pick constantly.Most litter bins are full at the weekends before lunch and remain overflowing sometimes for the rest of the weekend. TDC you are useless.