Ten volunteers from Thanet Green Party gathered at Ramsgate beach to do their bit as part of the national Surfers Against Sewage Big Spring Beach Clean Week on April 8.
Branch secretary Tricia Hartley said: “Big Spring Beach Clean Week is a national initiative, designed to clean up our lovely beaches, and particularly to remove plastic rubbish which won’t biodegrade and can be dangerous to marine wildlife. The week is sponsored by environmentally friendly detergent company Ecover, who will be recycling some of the plastics retrieved from beaches across the country. There have been several beach cleans on the Isle this week, including on Ramsgate’s Western Undercliff beach and at Joss Bay.
“We must pay tribute to people in Ramsgate for the really good state the beach was in: there was only a handful of plastic bottles, and most of the litter was smaller stuff like beer bottle tops and takeaway coffee cups. We know several local dog walkers carry plastic bags with them to pick up litter as they go, and they’re clearly making a real difference. We’d set aside two hours, but we were finished in an hour and a half. Mind you, we still filled six bags with rubbish!”
Tricia added: “We’d like to thank Tony Child and the Thanet Coast Project for lending us equipment, which made our task a lot easier – and we hope all the people on Ramsgate Sands enjoying the great weather over the weekend appreciated our beautiful clean beach!”
Thanet Greens intend to organise beach cleans in other parts of the Isle over the summer period.