Cardiff Council is to install five special cigarette butt bins designed to ballot smokers as part of the ‘Love Where You Live’ campaign.
[aoa id=”1″]The bins will have a Perspex front, a divider down the middle and two slots on either side to allow disposal of cigarette ends. Each bin will be marked with different questions such as Cardiff Blues or Cardiff Devils? Shirley Bassey or Tom Jones? Manic Street Preachers or Stereophonics? Smokers will then decide which slot to use depending on their preference. At the end of each week results will be determined based on cigarette butt levels and posted on the Council’s social media platforms. The bins will be emptied and different questions will then be put forward for the following week.[/aoa]
The bins will be located at five different city centre locations from Monday and the scheme is to be piloted for a month.
Cabinet Member for Clean Streets, Recycling and Environment, Cllr Michael Michael said:
“This is obviously a bit of fun but there is a very serious message behind the campaign. It is estimated that across the UK 122 tonnes of smoking-related litter are dropped every day! This mess is time-consuming to clean up and costs the taxpayer millions of pounds each year. We are not encouraging people to smoke, but what we are doing is encouraging those that do to dispose of their cigarette ends responsibly. It is also worth stressing that cigarette filters are not biodegradable, but are made of a type of plastic which means that they can stay in the environment for up to 15 years and have deadly consequences for wildlife.”
According to recent street cleanliness surveys by Keep Wales Tidy, smoking-related litter was found on 80.3% of Welsh streets making it the most common type of litter in Wales. It is also the most counted item on European beaches.
https://twitter.com/cardiffcouncil/status/1035210789932736512
Residents are reminded that dropping a cigarette end on the ground is littering and that if a waste enforcement officer witnesses it, the person responsible will be handed an £80 Fixed Penalty Notice. Fixed Penalty Notices will also be sent to those caught littering from vehicles.
