Is UK now one big rubbish tip

[Sally20099]

im hoping I’ve only just noticed, and things aren’t actually getting worse, but where ever I drive at the moment, all the motorways, duel carriage ways and slip roads, are just full of rubbish all along crash barriers. Plastic bottles, drinks cartons, random plastic wrapping - all just building up and blowing around. I’ve never actually seen anyone litter but it must happen on mass. Who are these idiots littering our countryside, and why are they so relaxed about it. AIBU thinking there must be a growing population who don’t care about anything: how awful it looks; how many animals it kills (according to rspca +3m animals each year), the environmental impact etc.

The sense of civic duty is dead. The country itself is finished. Fast on its way to becoming a third world hellhole.

The small stuff like bottles and food packaging are chucked out of cars.

The worrying thing is that it's not just aesthetics.

It's a symptom of a failing social contract and a sign of worse to come. Where rubbish flourishes crime follows.

A whole caravan of shit has been toed and dumped in a road by my house

I've noticed it too. It's the worst it's ever been. A few things:
-Takeaway, drive through everywhere and people dumping stuff from cars.
-Councils with no money because the budgets for things like adult social care are not ring fenced.

I litter pick round my area and I refuse to accept this is how our country is going. If only a small group of us do this we could make a huge difference.

Meanwhile the govt. could put 5p on every can, bottle, crisp packet and coffee cup and use the money for street cleaning.

That has happened by us. It made the newspapers.

Everyone that cares about this really needs to try and fight against it and litter pick as much as they can. It's something we can all do and it does make a difference. It's absolutely disgusting the state this country is getting in and there's not enough being said or done about it. It should be being shouted about from the rooftops not just accepted.

DS's school organises litter picks every 3 months or so and they always collect LOTS of rubbish. Mainly vape cases and takeaway food waste. We are in South Wales.

There's been a poor dead fox on the dual carriageway near me, at least since monday. 😢

Everywhere has litter by the side of the road. Even Kent. Probably especially Kent as things blow off lorries.

There's a country park next to a leisure centre near where I live and there were bottles everywhere. Why are people dumping so many plastic bottles - full and empty?

It’s definitely got worse and it’s all to do with the breakdown of society with no consequences or consideration for anyone or anything except self .

I'm a member of a large volunteer litter picker group and we do sterling work. Unfortunately, we cannot pick along dual carriageways for safety reasons, so they often look bad. So much rubbish is thrown from moving cars.

I’m a village litter picker and sick of picking up bags of human waste (with gloves and sticks), discarded food, Mac Donalds
and Costa packaging, etc.

There is not enough social shame.

It’s been like this for at least a decade. That’s when I first rang our local authority to ask why it was so bad. They told me increased population density and more takeaway outlets. We don’t need to be eating and drinking in cars all the time.

In my experience, it's young men in cars, eating, drinking and vaping as they drive, then lobbing the remnants out of the window.

I see them do it on my road. Sone even stop outside my house, empty their rubbish onto the pavement /into the gutter, then drive off. This tends to be under the cover of darkness (caught on my ring doorbell).

I sometimes wonder if it's linked to the gig economy and cost of living, with more people having multiple jobs, a lot if them as delivery drivers/uber drivers.

Dont get me started on the bottles of piss on the verges.

North Staffs/Cheshire border is sparsely populated though. Drive through Birmingham and it's a different story.

My town is okish, but we have lots of volunteers. The main roads and dual carriageways are horrific. I think covid was the watershed. It was not like this before then. I worry my kids think it’s normal. I will vote for anyone who fixes it.

Beautiful very rural location.
Rubbish everywhere and getting worse and worse.

I always notice when I travel to Europe (usually France) how many more street cleaners there seem to be. The general public may be just as lazy with their litter but there is a lot of organised street cleaning. Public places tend to look much nicer as a result.

Ha, you should see the state of Bradford. Absolutely disgusting.

https://cleanupbritain.org/ have launched a 10 point action plan.

Please write to your MP about littering! If everyone writes to their MP - National Highways / local council will be inundated with requests and will need d support from central Government.

We need fines to be increased, enforcement action and enhanced monitoring. Collecting litter needs to be done by those subjext
to community service. I’d also advocate those seeking my asylum or out of work take part (obviously subject to being fit and able). It would help with their mental health, encourage engagement, be in the fresh air and improve the local area too. Maybe it would also help with some of the tensions we have in society? .

The situation with litter makes me so sad and makes me want to emigrate.

I wish we were more like Japan, but I think it's down to a societal issue. Over there they pride themselves on keeping places clean. In fact it's common for people to take their rubbish home with them as they're aren't actually many public bins but it's so ingrained into respect and the culture that nobody would dare litter anyway and if they did would be shamed for it.

We keep our village clean, and I have sent requests to the council for litter picks, and to be fair they do come out quickly.

The main roads are bad, but again, when I have complained, I have received schedules of when they are due to be done. It seems they do them twice a year now. Cost plus health and safety. In the old days they just sent out crews. Now they need to close the roads, and keep everyone safe. Not saying that's bad, but when use locals do it, we just get on and do it!

The most revolting thing locally, and rurally, is the delivery drivers piss in bottles and leave them on the lanes. We also found piles of human shit and toilet paper. Nice. It goes well with the dog shit bags people hang on trees.

People are just shits.

Oh that’s sad to hear. I went to Dublin 10 years ago and I was amazed how clean it was (compared to where I live in England!)