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Video:
Bill Bryson on the blight on Britain's streets
“Just so you know,” says the man from the Campaign to Protect Rural England,
“your photographer asked if Bill would pose inside a litter bin, and Bill
said no.” Poor Bill Bryson, I think, the world's gentlest, funniest writer,
an unjudgmental man who sees interesting things in the everyday, has
suddenly found himself in the crass world of photo opportunities. I am just
as bad. My idea is that the new president of the CPRE, which today launches
a campaign against litter and fly-tipping called Stop The Drop, should walk
around Green Park in Central London confronting litter louts. Bill, the man
from the CPRE assures me, won't do that either.
In the world of newspapers, from where Bryson hails, there are sub-editors who
stay in the office, reporters who leave it and star writers who itch to rule
the world. With The Lost Continent, his 1989 account of a journey across
America, Bryson moved from the first category - he once subbed on The Times
- to the second. With Notes from a Small Island, his book about Britain a
dozen years ago, we claimed the boy from Des Moines, Iowa, as our own
national treasure. It is the third step, towards stardom, at which he
falters. He just shows no interest in stardom, no lust for power.
What he is interested in is picking up rubbish and, armed with a
litter-grabber provided by me and pursued by Richard the photographer and
Ariadne the video-multitasker from Times Online, off he goes.
Despite this paparazzi escort, his diligent litter-grabbing prompts no
attention from the park's picnickers and snoggers. Perhaps his ruddy,
bearded face misleads them into thinking that he has been sweeping up after
them for years. Within ten minutes, his green sack is half full. As he pours
the cache into the bin that he wouldn't be caught dead standing in, his face
betrays serious satisfaction. This is a man who not only inveighs against
other folk's detritus, and who will shortly begin writing a column for this
paper about it, but who actually enjoys picking it up.
My first thought is obsessive-compulsive disorder. “Well, it has become a bit
of an obsession; I'm trying not to allow it to become too serious,” he says.
“One reason I wanted to do these columns for The Times is that they will
make me be a little bit more light-hearted about it.”
After decades of yo-yoing between the States and Britain, he settled in
Norfolk in 2003. A few weeks ago, he says, he went on a village litter-pick
and collected a “huge” amount. But as he was being driven to the station
this morning, he saw rubbish once more accumulating. “So when I get home I
will go out and do it again.” What, tonight? “No, no, when I get home next
week. Only because it just needs doing. Once you've done something like
that, you begin to feel proprietorial about it. Even if it's not your own
road. I mean, every time I come to this part of Green Park, I will now feel
a sort of ownership.”
This means the obsession will only get worse? “It's going to get absolutely
worse and worse. It is slightly a problem because it's like with anything:
you can tip over and spend your whole life seeing nothing but litter. I was
just out walking on the South Downs and you have to remind yourself from
time to time to stop looking for litter. Just look at the scenery and enjoy
it.”
To be clear, our new columnist does not suffer from obsessive-compulsive
disorder, although he admits to writing in a tidyish office and to
harbouring an instinct to improve things. “Looking out now on Green Park,
it's just lovely, almost unimprovable. But if I did sit here for a while I
probably would think: ‘They could actually do with another couple of trees
there.'”
For the rest of us, a good starting point would be “first do no harm”,
although it pains Bryson to record that a few months ago he himself did
harm. He was off to Belgium with his family on Eurostar and the security
people at St Pancras would not let him take his coffee through. Since St
Pancras does not do bins, he placed the paper cup on a shelf. Neatly. “I had
no choice but to litter and I think we are all pushed into that position
from time to time.”
Mainline railway stations are notorious, I say, ever since they decided their
contribution to the War on Terror would be to take away our rubbish bins. So
now we litter and excuse ourselves that it is the job of the man with the
big mop on permanent patrol. The answer, he says, is to supply what other
stations have: transparent plastic bins. “My conviction is that bins have
been taken away from places, like lay-bys in particular, where there is no
terrorist danger. It's been done as a convenience to the local authorities
who persuade themselves that somehow this will encourage people to take
their litter home with them. Demonstrably, that's not true.”
So about this CPRE campaign. Take action, it says: lobby your local authority.
Get involved: join Litter Action's “online community”. Get informed: sign-up
for Bryson's e-bulletins. All very good, and all very un-Bill Bryson, an
ironist not an activist if I've ever met one. “Part of me,” he admits, “is a
grumpy old man, but a part of me thinks that being a grumpy old man is
pathetic and ridiculous, so I suppose I vacillate between those two poles.”
The not very grumpy, not very old man (he's 56) got mixed up with the CPRE
almost accidentally. He was on a reading tour a few years ago and people
asked, as they tend to, why he eventually plumped to live in Britain. The
real answer is that in 1973 he married one of us, a psychiatric nurse called
Cynthia Billen (yes, I know) and this is just the consummation of their love
affair. But the next questions always asked were what he liked best about
Britain and then, inevitably, what he liked least. To that, he would always
say litter and that would win him applause. He suggested that people e-mail
him their support. By the tour's end, 1,000 had done so. He wrote to the
CPRE, suggesting that would make a good mailing list for any campaign that
it might care to run. It had a better idea: that he should run them.
“It was a sort of quid pro quo, that they would get behind the campaign in a
big way if I became president. So I went away and thought about it.” The
CPRE, he says, and I paraphrase, is really two organisations. It is its
London office, filled by dedicated, cerebral policy wonks, and it is its
local memberships with agendas of their own: the Essex lot oppose the
expansion of Stansted; in Hants they want the Western Weald to be included
in the South Downs Park.
“It is a strange experience for me. It's not something that I'm naturally
drawn to. I'm not good at it. I mean, I'm really not good at it. My whole
life for quite a long time has been totally solitary, so I'm not used to
working with people. And although I really enjoy the collaborative side of
things, I also just kind of think if you have an idea that something needs
to be done, everybody should see immediately that's the way to go. The whole
idea of trying to build consensuses and things like that is just totally
alien to me.”
In the privacy of their studies, all writers are dictators, littering white
space with their words. Out in the real world, they can be as shy as
Wombles. As the CPRE's head, he is needing to get better at confront-ation.
He is having, for instance, a little run-in with the National Trust. It
concerns Dovedale in the Peak District, which he discovered awash with
litter.
“I had an exchange of letters in which I encouraged them to put litter bins
there and they refused to do it. They feel that litter bins attract more
litter, and they feel that, by not having litter bins there, they are
encouraging people to take litter away from them. My argument is that, by
not having litter bins there, they are encouraging people to drop litter.
And I do genuinely feel that the impression that bodies such as the National
Trust give, in a situation like that, is that they are completely
indifferent to litter. There's no notice saying: ‘Please don't litter.' They
say that a litter bin would be an intrusion, that it would spoil the bucolic
scene. But they don't seem to feel the same way about donation boxes. So I
think it's a difference of philosophy there, but I have to say that my
experience with the National Trust in that respect is very disappointing.”
On his walk along the South Downs Way, he found another National Trust car
park without a bin. He will write again. “And again it will get me nowhere.”
He does not wish to be negative, but he believes that every landowner has a
respons-ibility to help people to dispose of their litter responsibly and
that the NT is slightly in a state of denial.
Even more impressively for an introvert, Bryson recently confronted a litter
lout. A young man had thrown the remains of his fish and chips into a
doorway near Victoria station. “I was right behind him and I just stopped
him and said: ‘Son,' (it always seems to me better to say ‘son') ‘you know,
you live in a really beautiful country; you ought to love it.' As I said
this to him, I thought: ‘He's going to deck me,' but, in fact, he turned
round, he looked at me, very slowly, and he said (he had a very heavy
Scottish accent): ‘You're absolutely right. I'm sorry. I'm just very, very
drunk.' And he went back and picked it up and took it. He was obviously a
good kid. I was lucky to get away with it. There have been other cases when
I've seen people do stuff and I haven't said anything to them because they
do it in such a conspicuous way that they're making a statement and it's not
worth getting knifed or punched in the face.”
So he is not supporting vigilantism? “No, no, no. But at the same time I think
we're getting increas-ingly into a position where people are afraid to speak
out about anything, and, you know, I think you should.” It must be hard for
a non-confrontational soul such as him? “There's not one bit of this that I
want to do. I mean, I'd rather just be home in my garden or writing a book:
A Walk on the South Downs Way.” He is actually writing one now on the
history of household objects: on why, for instance, we all have salt and
pepper on our kitchen tables. He had promised Cynthia that he would stay in
more.
“But this is just something I decided I had to do. This is the one campaign
that I'll become involved with in my life and I'll give it my best shot and
try to make a difference, but it's not a change of character for me. I'm not
now going to be an activist for the rest of my life.”
Although some of us, to this small island's shame, have told him to push off
back to America if he does not like our litter, it may well take a Yank to
bring us to our senses. He may be naive in some respects. Imposing, as he
has suggested, VAT on takeaway meals would surely lose more votes than would
be won by any initative to use the extra revenue to clean streets. And I
enjoyed his plan to devise a chewing gum that dissolves in the rain (but
not, presumably, in the mouth). But being American takes the class sting out
of what might look like a middle-class, middle-England campaign. Near his
place in London, he says, there is yuppie litter. “Yakult yoghurt pots,” he
says darkly. “Not just the working man's crap.”
If I take nothing more away from our encounter - apart from my litter, of
course - it is the thought that picking up other people's rubbish would make
a good hobby for many of us. It gets you out into the fresh air, the
equipment is cheap and the feeling of accomplishment, once done, total.
Also, as is not the case with trains or birds, we will never, I fear, run
out of things to collect.
Britain really should take a close look on how for example scandinavian countries battle waste- recycling has been made easy for everyone everywhere.
MTK, Helsinki,
Go for it Bill! Britain should do as Bill says. Forget the politicians. Follow people like Bill.
Jim Wills, Brisbane, Australia
Bill is so right. I have read all his books and it never ceaces to amaze me (after I have wiped away my tears of laughter) how spot on he is with his observations. I was brought up a child of the sixties with the words 'Keep Britian Tidy' everywhere I went. Where is the respect ?
Gillian Dennis, Swindon, England
It amazes me that the "authorities" do not take matters further and use the laws already available to "nick" litter offendeers. Just walking around local towns one can see the cigarette butts lying around all over the place (particularly so after the no-smoking ban). We all see these offenders hiding in shop doorways, outside office back/front doors. It would come as a great shock to many of them to pick up a quick £80 fine after popping outside for a "puff". Why are the CPSO's/council officers not keeping an eye out for this sort of thing and actually doing something about it.
Michael Graham, Essex, UK
I have absolutely no hope that Britain will clean itself up before it sinks under its own trash. Forty years ago, when I lived in Utah (and started recycling) I advised some South African friends to go home via England, where they had never been. They reported that everywhere they went there was an incredible amount of trash, swore they would never go back.
People don't care, the government don't care; there are many things that can be done easily and wihout much cost; a deposit system on all drinks tins and bottles would be a start.
I spent the Millenium on Waterloo Bridge and dragged myself back the following morning to watch the trash being picked up (I'm fascinated by trash and would love to be a household trash inspector!!!). It was knee deep in some places, food wrappers, drinks' bottles. People could take the bottles full to their pic-nic but wouldn't carry the empties home.
Disgusting.
alice hudson, quimper, france
Sir,
Bill Bryson is a sort of hero of mine. I think I have read all his books and he is one of the few Authors who has made me laugh out loud in bed. So like the idiot I am, I wrote to him not knowing what the initials, C.P.R.E., stood for in his address. When I did find out that it was the Campaign to Protect Rural England, I was cross that it was spread over one and a half Comment pages of the Saturday Scottish Edition of The Times!
This is meat and drink to the Nationalists. They will call it ‘bullying’ and use it as another reason for removing Scotland from England.
I live in Glasgow and have no time for the Nationalists. I have no wish to be split from England. I do not want England to help this process by making stupid bloody mistakes which are so obvious!
Incidentally, I agreed with everything that Bill wrote about. I help run a small Charity that I started some 16 years ago which spends time cleaning up the banks and surrounding Parkland of the River Kelvin.
A. Mark Eden-Bushell, Glasgow, Scotland
I think it's pretty sad too, every time I go back to the U.K. I'm an expat Brit, and I really like that here there isn't nearly as lmuch litter.
"Don't mess with Texas" is the anti-litter slogan, and mostly it seems to work.
Roger, RIchmond, Texas, USA
As a person who does not drop litter I have to agree, sadly, with the thing about empty cans. If you put one in your pocket it will upend and tip whatever concoction was in it, or the remnants of it, into your pocket. Carrying your own rubbish home is one thing but pretending that all people will do it just because they should is ridiculous. The simple answer would be for advertisers to devise campaigns which show littering to be highly uncool, or whatever the cuurent term is, for young people. Peer group pressure is the only thing that seems to reach the sort of kids who drop rubbish. And no not the nice normal 95 percent of children who are reasonable and like we were.
PSF, London, UK
A man in England got a hefty fine when he discarded an envelope bearing his name and address in a litter bin in a park, because he should have recycled it. Britain will not get tidier as long as lunacy like this is tolerated, indeed - mandated.
Peter Byles, Brackley, UK
I read an article Bill wrote a while back and as I was seriously fed up with my local park and woods being littered I decided to do something about it starting New Year's Day.
About 300 carries bags full later the place looks much better.
Sure I get strange looks and sure I embarrass my kids but the results are worth it.
Tom Wright, Reigate,
"it's unreasonable to expect people to carry an empty can or wrapper for half an hour"
Why? Don't you have pockets? Do you find the empty can too heavy? Are you allergic to the wrapper? Why exactly can't you hold it or put it in your pocket until you see a bin?
Julia, London,
American expats: It's not so rosy back home. I live in Santa Barbara, one of the most beautiful cities on earth. Yet health-obsessed yuppies don't think twice about dropping their water bottles from their bicycles on bike trails once they are done, and they don't dare "dirty" their cars when they bring fast food to the local orchid show which lets people park on a beautiful mesa. Add porn mags, beer cans, and more bottles from runners, and open space is rapidly becoming "someone else's" concern, even if broken glass can harm both pet dogs and local wildlife.
Carol, Santa Barbara, USA/CA
Bravo Bill. As an Aussie living in London for the past four years, I've been disgusted by the level of street litter. We live in Bermondsey and wrote to the council about the amount of take-away litter just tossed on to the street out the front of our house (we live near a little row of off-licenses plus three take-away food venues). They installed yet another bin out the front. No change - the louts just chuck it on the footpath regardless. Suggest councils get serious about policing litter louts and charging these mongrels for their disgraceful behaviour. Back home we have had the Keep Australia Beautiful campaign gonig for years. And it works. Adopt the same principles here and reap the rewards of cleaner streets and parks.
Nathan, London, England
I don't agree with Bill Bryson's belief that more litter bins would be a major part of the solution. It seems to me that most litter collects 'around' litter bins but seldom in them. Furthermore, I work part time looking after the placing of trolleys at a supermarket car park. I would estimate that at least 75% of the public fail to place their trolleys back in the trolley bay where they found them but leave them lying hapahzardly around the car park, in parking spaces and on the open road. There is an anology here with litter with a similar percentage of the population involved. Heaven help us.
Bill Duley, Cleobury Mortimer, Shropshire
You can’t reasonably expect everyone not to litter when there are often no bins in certain places.
As someone who does not eat or drink on the move much, I’m not really affected, but it’s unreasonable to expect people to carry an empty can or wrapper for half an hour; there should either be more bins or more street cleaners.
Karl Chads, London, UK
It does not seem to matter if there is a bin available either. My local shop has 2 litter bins and one for re-cycling. People drop thier litter as they walk past the bins or leave thier empty drinks cans and bottles on the conveniently placed wall adjacent to the bins.. Where is thier intelligence? Obviously it's not thier day for the family brain cell! They believe the litter is the fault of the council for not collecting it. Litter costs councils money to collect, so every litter lout is adding to our already overburdening council tax. Thier stupidity is beyond belief, but point it out to them and all you get is a mouthfull of abuse. Let's start collecting the litter, follow the litterers home and drop it throught thier letterbox!
Ron, Milton Keynes, Bucks
Well done Bill, litter is my pet hate too.
The worst type of litter in my experience is not putting used diaposable nappies in bins. In our local sport centre car park, used also by an arts centre and large shopping centre there are no bins. But each building has baby changing facilities. Despite this I regularly see used nappies left in this car park - sometimes for days -what a health risk. My other pet hate is chewing gum on pavements, these lumps of gum have been worked round peoples mouths then deposited on the pavement. It's disgusting, just like spitting which used to be banned becasue of TB.
I too am embarassed when my German colleagues visit, by British litter and the lack of on street recyling facilities . Recently I visited Singapore where no one dares to drop gum or fag ends , and Australia where there are many humerous bin labels such as "Don't be a Tosser". Is it education or have we just become a "Shameless " society? I fear the latter!
Rebecca, Banbury, OXON
If you think littering in the open is bad, try getting on a London bus, especially those in the south of the city.
Paper, cans, bottles (nearly always Lucozade ones) and wrappers are the norm, but chicken bones, peanut shells and fruit stones are common.
I once asked a woman not to drop her plum stones on the floor of the bus, saying it was unacceptable and likely to attract flies. She had no idea that what she was doing was wrong. Rather than anyone supporting me, one man said she should ignore me as I was being racist and that it was a 'white thing'. It hasn't deterred me, though.
To vent my anger, I pick up cans and bottles from the streets where I live and put them in the nearest recycling bin. I also take papers that have been left on buses and trains and put them in a recycling bin too.
I urge everyone to just do this once, and to confront litter droppers.
Nigel Doran , London,
Well done to Bill Bryson. Is he now planning on writing "Notes from a Messy Island"?
I'm English but have lived in Germany for 18 years and feel deeply ashamed when environmentally-conscious German friends travel to the UK and report back to me on the shocking amounts of ltter they see lying around in public places such as motorway service stations.
Here's hoping that Bill Bryson will succeed in contributing to educating people in Britain about taking responsibility for this important issue.
Lisa, Memmingen, Germany
I have just sent this email to the CPRE, It may be of interest to you all
Dear Sirs
I have just heard on the BBC about Bill Brysons Campaign about 10p on plastic bottles, and that if people return bottles to the bottle bank they will get 10p back per bottle.
We are a Disabled Green Household please note:-
Our black bin each week contains 30liter bag of rubbish for a house with 2 adults 3 children 2 dogs, 3 cats.
Each month we have 3 wheelie bins on green rubbish.
We also each month have a brown wheelie bin with recyclable garden waste.
In the home we only have one light fitting with non energy efficient lightbulbs.
We have energy saving extension leads that stop standby waste.
Our bedding is made from recycled plastic bottles.
Our old clothing, shoes, glasses go to third world countries.
We can’t recycle tetra cartons because our council do not do a scheme!
continued see below
S Vye, Leeds, UK
Cont: see above
We would love solar or wind power but are on benefits and live in a council adapted property (why the council cant provide green energy I don’t know) and without help or a grant we cant afford to.
So by now I guess you think we would approve of this new Campaign!
This is so not true!!!!
If your campaign goes ahead we would loose a lot of money and also increase our carbon footprint!
As I say we recycle – however you now want us to save our recyclables that the council usually take away. Then use our 4 x 4 disability car (a need due to nature of disability) and petrol and travel to a recycling center in order to get back the money we would loose on these bottles?????? Do you know how stupid this seems to us?
2 Hours to get ready
Travelling time
Petrol
Wear and tear on vehicle
Plus after this trip due to the nature of my disability a full day in bed to recover!!!!!
S Vye, Leeds, UK
When on your next train journey, look at how much rubbish is tipped over fences from houses backing on to the railway embankments. It's quite obvious where the childrens toys, household appliances and the like have come, from yet what is done?
I know the train companies have enough problems on their hands by trying to run a service, but surely they should clear this mess away.
It's just another example of 'I don't care, it's someone elses problem now.
Andrew, Orpington, Kent
The 'KEEP AUSTRALIA BEAUTIFUL' campaign is a tremendous success. It is completely socially unacceptable to drop rubbish including cigarette butts. There, your friends, family and strangers on a street don't mind giving you a piece of their mind for descrating the urban/country environment. They even have a 'CLEAN UP AUSTRALIA DAY' where people volunteer their time to pick rubbish.
Littering needs to be made socially unacceptable. The anti-littering campaign has worked wonders in Australia so I would suggest follow the lead of the former British colony.
For a country established by the supposed worst of the worst they now have better bins availability, doggie bags/bins,better bins, and far superior garabage collection services than the ones left behind in the UK (and less people on the ends of brooms).
Bring back transportation to Botany Bay!
Rose Byrne, London,
If you want to see the origin of the problem look around school perimeters, or the routes kids take as they walk to school eating junk food then discarding the wrappings.
The above behaviour has been going on for about thirty years now and is linked to poor education to much money and above all a society in a rush.
wayne, huntingdon, cambridgeshire
This not new, In the 40/50s I grew up on a street witha mill at the end. The girls used to buy their fish and chips and chuck the papers in our garden, they did not usually dump the chips, I expect people did not waste food much in those times. At least they used our front garden as a waste bin!
I think things got a lot worse with the advent of fast food, I think Mc D etc should be fined for every piece of litter found near their outlets.
No body takes responsibility for anything today, Smokers are
inveterate litter louts as when they are done with their cig it always goes on the floor. Look at any bus stop or nowadays smoking point outside buildings. People empty their car ashtrays out of the window as well.
plato, ely, uk
Good on him, I myself get into a rage when I see rubbish left by selfish people thrown out of cars - plastic bottles and cigarette packs. I carry a black bin liner and plasic glove to pick up litter from my favourite spots. we need someone like him in italy where i live. We have a problem in italy in the south but that is a failure of the state and the inability of the people and enough of a desire to do something about it.. I noticed aso since the advent of free newspapers in London how much mpre litter there is particularly on the metro. Have londoners already forgottn the disaster of Kings Cross
Simon , Arezzo, italy
In the national parks in New Zealand there are no bins, and interestingly, there is absolutely no litter. There are however lots of notices asking people not to litter.
I suspect and hope that this campaign will lead to a tipping point in peoples' behaviour. Littering will reduce if people are encouraged to take an interest in their own environment.
David, Auckland, New Zealand
Bill Bryson is absolutely right. People in this country throw litter everywhere without a care or a thought for the mess it leaves. I live on a rural road which happens to be a short cut for some - and all along the grass verges and otherwise unspoilt country lanes there are plastic bags, water bottles, etc. Can't these people just keep their rubbish in their car (or more often, white van) until they reach somewhere that has a bin?
Sarah, Macclesfield, Cheshire
I am a Yank who hails from Minnesota, next door to Bill's Iowa. I too married a Brit and have lived in this beautiful country happily since 1981. But, like Bill, I have always been mystified by the cavalier attitude the British have to littering. When I first arrived here I was shocked and astounded to see well-dressed professional people thoughtlessly tossing cups, wrappers etc onto the pavement. The evils of littering are drummed into the heads of American children from a very early age. I recently reprimanded a pair of youths who tossed their fish and chips out of their car in a B&Q car park. However, they just yelled obscenities at me and sped off -leaving me to do the cleaning up.
Chris, London,
When I was in high school in the US, a group of us 'adopted' a mile stretch of road. It was a standard thing they did in Pennsylvania and many of the main roads and highways got adopted. I think this would be a great way to help get the litter off our streets - put a plaque up after six months of service that this group or that has adopted this section of road. I got a lot out of it and if you get a good sized group to agree to even just doing it once a month, it can only help!
Liane, London, England