WILMSLOW is very, very lucky.

We have a group of volunteers who give up their time twice a month to go around our town picking up the litter that others discard unthinkingly. Wilmslow Clean Team I salute you.

You only have to venture a short way from Wilmslow to see what it’s like to live with litter, particularly along roadsides.

Motorway exits and big junctions in particular seem to be the places where drivers feel they can chuck away that empty can or crisp packet. Why? They care that they don’t have the litter in their car but it’s ok to throw it out of the window where it offends everybody else – or maybe that’s just me and Wilmslow Clean Team.

I remember reading a letter in my local paper a few years ago where a man suggested that the reason there was so much litter was because women chose to go out to work. His reasoning was that if women stayed at home then their children wouldn’t be out on the streets dropping litter everywhere. The awful thing was he was serious. He truly believed that this breakdown of the matriarchal influence (as he saw it) was responsible for so many of the ills in our society.

Needless to say there followed weeks of letters from women appalled at his view and rightly so. Yes children learn their public responsibilities from their parents but this doesn’t depend on whether the mum is working or not.

A year or so ago we noticed the dog poo bins on Lindow Common had disappeared. Oh, we thought more cutbacks, but no, in conversation with a council worker it appears some bright spark on the run up to Bonfire Night had decided it would be a hoot to throw some fireworks into the dog poo bin and literally blow it up. Dog poo everywhere, very amusing. But the cost to replace those bins wasn’t funny, nor was it great for the poor people who had to clear it up. I hope the mums AND DADS of those involved got some messages across to the youngsters involved.

Litter is a menace, it encourages rats and vermin, is unhealthy and unsightly. And it isn’t just young people who are to blame. Far from it, the roadside litter is mostly adults who don’t care who has to clean it up so long as it isn’t them. Maybe people caught in the act (and we have lots of cameras which could collect car registration numbers) could be made to go to these sites and spend a few hours removing the rubbish – it might make them think again before jettisoning their unwanted trash onto the roadside in future.

If you can spare an hour a month to help keep Wilmslow clear of litter, contact Wilmslow Clean Team on 07517 040841 or email them at wilmslowct@gmail.com. There are a couple of other groups who would also value support – Friends of Lacey Green and Friends of the Carrs.

Do you agree? Email yourviews@guardiangrp.co.uk