Brand New – Old Story

IT HAS TAKEN A LONG TIME, BUT FINALLY THE NEW SAINSBURY’S SUPERMARKET OPENED FOR BUSINESS.

I was surprised to discover, by virtue of the posted notice at the entrance (click image to enlarge photograph), that the brand new store had a very poor energy rating.

Things are indeed getting worse when buildings can be created that cost the earth.  One wonders if the sum total of the legislation in this regard results merely in the posting of a notice at the entrance.

Flat Bottles

I WAS AMAZED AT THIS SIGN — STUCK TO A GLASS RECYCLING BIN.

It says:

“Please wash your bottles, remove all caps and lids and FLATTEN them when possible”

Are they serious? Flattening clear glass bottles?  I wish I had brought my hammer!

I understand the idea behind recycling, but I cannot fathom the rest of  it all.  For a start, these bins are an eye-sore.  The public seem to use them to recycle glass, but they then leave their plastic bags and boxes everywhere — what a mess.  Throwing bottles in is noisy, it is dirty and inaccessible.

On top of all that, some bins are for all glass — regardless of colour!  I have never seen anyone wash off the labels and remove caps — I do wonder what happens to it when it is so contaminated.  Is it all just an elaborate hoax or something?

Packaging Ironic

WE WERE SENT THIS PICTURE BY E-MAIL RECENTLY, AND THOUGHT IT QUITE IRONIC.

What do you think?

If you double click on the image, it will enlarge — it shows a device that helps you open stubborn hard plastic sealed packing — but the device itself comes in stubborn hard plastic sealed packaging!

Are things getting worse, or is this an attempt to be “funny”?

The Big Rubbish Scam

GLASGOW COUNCIL HAVE FINALLY REALISED THAT THEIR RUBBISH REMOVAL SCHEME IS RUBBISH.

We have posted many articles here about this, check them out…

• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2008/03/01/litter-to-the-council/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/07/01/what-a-dump/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/06/18/sofa-so-good/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/05/08/litter-bugs/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/05/01/rubbish/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/04/24/streetlitter/

Unfortunately, instead of doing anything constructive or positive about all the rubbish we have to put up with, the city’s answer is to put up posters!

And these posters carry a threat – we could actually be fined if we do not put rubbish out on proper days, and if we do not keep everything neat and tidy!

The responsibility is ours – not the city council’s! What do we pay council tax for?

There is always a let out clause with the council rubbish uplift — it’s called Health and Safety. If there are rats, they can refuse to uplift. What then? According to an article in Glasgow’s Evening Times:

“Patrick McManus, 34, an architectural technician who lives in a nearby block in Calder Street, said:

‘It’s starting to look like Paddy’s Market.
‘There are rats everywhere and notices up in the back court warning people about them. It’s a health risk. I’m just sick of it. I’m trying to sell my house and am paying my council tax, so why can’t they sort it out?’”(Evening Times 30 July 2007)

Glasgow City Council even has a web page dedicated to the rat problem:

• Pest Control: Rats

There is also a 24 hour telephone number: 0141 287 9700 and select option 3.

“Do not expect instant results. Rats are naturally wary of new food sources and it may be some time before they are comfortable eating the bait. Once they start to feed on the bait it can take between 3 to 10 days for the poison to be effective. You must make sure that children and pets never get access to any rat poison”

The British pest Control Association can provide a list of exterminators on-line — it’s very short and simple form:

• http://www.bpca.org.uk/

The BBC warned about rats back in 2002 when all this rubbish on the streets began — see:

• http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2164999.stm

By the way, rubbish, vermin, filth and litter is not a local problem, it is countrywide one:

• The One Show

This BBC TV program shows that even though people are paying council tax, they are having to resort to picking up litter themselves.

Amazingly, this approach is actually a formal and official procedure in Glasgow!  As part of the “Clean Glasgow” Campaign, volunteers are encouraged to collect litter in their spare time — and for no pay!

• Volunteer Litter Picking — organised by the city council

The Glasgow evening newspaper took the amazing step of printing lists of names of people convicted of littering — to a good deal of controversy! Check out their defence and the readers’ comments:

• Litter Louts Dropped Us in This Mess

The”Clean Glasgow”campaign is costing an estimated £4 000 000 this year. In my opinion, four million pounds is a lot of money to supply bin bags for volunteers, rat poison, rat helpline and some posters. The Evening Times naming and shaming campaign printed lists in blocks of 500 — that means each list represents a block of income of on-the-spot fines of £50. So one list would bring in 25 grand!

The council are making mugs of us.  If you drop a cigarette butt, you are fined £50 on top of your council tax.  Meantime, the putting the rubbish out front policy is leading to health and safety issues, which in turn means that rubbish cannot be uplifted until somebody calls the 24 hours rat helpline, the poison takes effect and then perhaps the volunteers can arrive to do the work (bin bags supplied, of course).

The only way out of this is to have the city council change policy back to placing rubbish in lanes and away from the pavements.  That would encourage people to refrain from dropping litter, and make everywhere better and cleaner. Admittedly, the problem will have shifted round the back — but is it not better to have the rats there instead of where we all walk?

More rubbish bins and better collections would be good too — and could be paid for from the vast profits of the on-the-spot fines.

It is adding insult to injury to ask volunteers to pick up rubbish and remove piles of fly-tipped goods.  At the very least this should be a punishment meted out to people with ASBOs — perhaps a form of community service?

Things are getting worse, when we put up with this scam, and when we allow councils to shirk the community responsibility tat is the reason for their very existence!

Litter to the Council

THE LITTER EPIDEMIC IN SHAWLANDS IS GETTING WORSE!

I walk past a lane on Kilmarnock Road almost every day, and I cannot ever recall a time when it has been free from rubbish — but it is getting worse lately, and I know the area is suffering a serious rat problem. Click on the picture to enlarge, and bear in mind that this is on the busiest road/ shopping street south of the river – the lane is, in fact, between two rows of busy shops. Imagine the scene when it has been raining!

In recent years, the council (in a silly attempt to encourage “recycling”) refuse to uplift from back lanes and courts, insisting instead that everyone dump stuff on pavements out to the front of their homes for uplift on specific days.

The result is unhealthy, ugly and dangerous. In the past, when people were having minor works carried out on their flat, rubbish would be immediately removed and dumped out back in the lane or at the bins for uplift. It is reasonable and perfectly understandable to me that people would not want to store the rubbish inside their newly renovated homes until a special rubbish uplift day — but that is what the council seems to want us all to do nowadays!

The idea that you dump stuff out the front depends on the dumping only being done on specific days — and that is just unworkable! The result is that people dump their rubbish as and when they want, and it can lie there until it is uplifted on it’s special day.

I wish someone would realise the truth about human nature, and admit that the scheme has failed — then we can resort to putting the rubbish out in the back lane where it can lie until uplifted at a time that suits the council.

Related Articles and pictures:

• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/07/01/what-a-dump/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/06/18/sofa-so-good/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/05/08/litter-bugs/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/05/01/rubbish/
• http://gettingworse.wordpress.com/2007/04/24/streetlitter/

Plastic Christmas Tree

IT’S ALWAYS NICE TO SEE A DECORATED TREE AT CHRISTMAS.

This one is a real tree, it’s just that it has been decorated with litter — plastic bags mainly. How lovely!

What a lovely show the locals have put on for everyone this year. They must be so proud of their town. Merry Christmas Everyone!

Bin Caught Obstructing

IT IS DIFFICULT ENOUGH to negotiate bollards, fences, dimpled pavements, pot-holes, overgrown hedges, dog fouling, cafe tables and chairs and cigarette smokers — but what is going on with all the large black wheelie bins on the main roads of Shawlands (Shawlands is in Glasgow, by the way — not Lanarkshire)?

We’ve all heard of traffic calming, is this now about calming the number of pedestrians as well? maybe they want to dissuade shoppers from using the area — after all Silverburn and Braehead do not have rubbish and bins in the mall for people to avoid!

I was told that it might have something to do with shops having no access at the rear of the shop of uplifting bins — but that’s poppycock; for more years than I can remember there have been shops on this road, and refuse collection was never before such an issue as it seems to have become today. We did not have to live with such rubbish and such massive bins on our pavements for all these years!

In the pictures shown here, these ugly and unhealthy wheelie bins are at Shawlands Cross, opposite each other. Notice that there are fences, so the pavement is narrowed and people are channelled along them. The crossing presents a gap in the fence — that is where these bins are! Exactly at the wrong place — a place where people stop, stand and wait to cross! People NOT wanting to cross have to stand behind wheelie bins, next to a fence until the pedestrians have crossed the road (and before the arrival of the folk from the other side).

It beggars belief, it really does! Left to the council and the interferers and busy-bodies, Shawlands will choke and die — just like Victoria Road, Cowcaddens, and much of the West End. Oh to roll the clock back 7 years to when Shawlands was happy and carefree!

Yes, things are getting worse. No doubt.

Litter Bugs

IT IS INCONSIDERATE TO LITTER.

But why do we do it?  And how do we stop it happening?  This is something done by people, not multi-nationals, not governments, not terrorists, just friends, neighbours and acquaintences.

Maybe people have got used to the fact that refuse collection is rubbish (excuse the pun).  The rule is now to put trash out the front — onto the pavement — for collection.  I have ranted about this, because the collection is poor and people are putting out their rubbish on the wrong days.  I just think it is ugly and a hazard to all. This is the fault of the council.

I have also ranted about recycling and why it has to be the responsibility of the council and not the individual.

If we could return to our senses, if the council collected rubbish regularly, and if the streets were clear of rubbish, then perhaps folks would try to keep the area clear and clean? Until then things will just keep getting worse!

Rubbish

I HEARD ON BBC RADIO FOUR AT LUNCHTIME TODAY A DISCUSSION ABOUT RUBBISH.

People in England were getting heated about wheelie bins and recycling.

Quite right too. I got heated enough about litter in Shawlands to blog here about it!

Recycle

Look, like most people, I am all for recycling — but (also like most people), if it is too difficult or inconvenient, then I can’t be bothered. Fair enough?

The answer would therefore seem to lie in finding ways to make recycling easier.

However, that is not among the options being considered by local authorities in Britain today. We are to be coerced, persuaded and cajoled to rub against the grain, to go against the organic, natural flow of human nature to be lazy. And because of this choice, complex rules and enforcements will have to be devised and the whole thing is destined to fail.

Who’s Responsible?

The whole thing seems to boil down to a single idea: to make every single person responsible for sorting and recycling their own rubbish.

Smaller Trashcan

If you have several colour-coded bins containing different types of rubbish, then it follows that the “traditional rubbish” bin would shrink in size.

Fewer Collections

The thinking continues: if the “traditional rubbish” bin is smaller, then it will not need to be collected as frequently as in the days before the recycling — perhaps every two weeks or more, instead of once or twice per week.

Fears

But what if people do not recycle very well? The bin will not reduce as much as anticipated, so there is talk about fining people who produce too much rubbish — levying an excess rubbish tax, the more you throw away, the more you pay.

Penalties

But the thinking is flawed. It targets single parents and young families (who produce more rubbish across the board) compared with yuppie couples and affluent retired folks.

Stealth Tax and Irresponsibility

We each already pay a lot of tax, and Council Tax is supposed to be for refuge collection, averaging the cost across a region and across society. This fee or fine would have be in addition to Council Tax if the intention is to influence or persuade.

What about the producers of the goods we buy — the make the packaging in the first place, we merely discard it.

When you think about it, the problem does not lie with the householder, the consumer or the average person — so why should the solution be his or her responsibility?

I get a lot of junk mail — why should it be my responsibility to bin or recycle this? I did not ask to be the target of a junk mail sales campaign.

I buy food, not containers, not cans, not packaging, I don’t want them; I want the contents. Why should I be held responsible for binning or recycling things over which I have no control?

Culture and Society

Apart from the failure to consider that one-size does not fit all when it comes to bins, and that different people have different amounts of rubbish depending on myriad circumstances, this is moving the goalposts again; we have all grown up in one world, and now we find that we are in quite a different deal altogether. And that is fundamentally unfair.

• It attacks and undermines our culture, our rationality, our trust in our neighbours, our councils, our governments and our society.

What an ugly world it would be too — different coloured wheelie bins everywhere. Bin lorries everywhere all the time, roads being churned up, increased fly-tipping, lockable bins. Distrust. Forgetting to put out a bin on the right day — vermin and ill-health increasing…

Alternative Solution

The answer is to make things simple. Simplify — reduce the variables, streamline the idea. Let’s start thinking again: we anticipate a landfill problem in the future and so we need to recycle as soon as possible.

Improve The Public Service

We need to invest in local authority refuse collection, sorting and recycling. We figure out the extra cost, and divide it up across the local authority area so that it averages out, and everyone pays the same small extra amount on their Council Tax. If push came to shove, financial re-allocation may be necessary, but I am sure that no-one would mind losing out on something in order to save the planet; everyone appreciates that you can’t have your cake and eat it, and that you have to give up something to get something.

Clear and Simple

The amount of sorting and recycling to be carried out by ordinary people must be reduced to a minimum — and it should be as simple and as clearly understood as possible.

Target the Culprits

Junk mail and packaging should be targeted by new legislation to reduce the problem at source — possibly with packaging colour coded to assist in sorting for recycling. Collections should be regular and frequent enough to maintain health, prevent an increase in vermin and diseases, and keep areas looking good.

• The responsibility for public services has to be with a public body, not the individual.
  

Things are definitely getting worse!