'Visitors to Delapre Park in Northampton left it in a disgusting state'

On the face of it, litter and what we do with our waste, isn’t perhaps the most pressing of issues that the county is facing right now.

This week I’ve seen lines of people queuing to return to certain stores in Northampton as the partial lockdown lifts still further; a massive relief not only to store owners and operators, but also the borough council.

I’ve watched as the leader – filmed for social media – implored people to return to retail here, saying categorically that the town is safe and that there is co-operation to make it safer still.

The county council is welcoming people back... by re-enforcing street and car park parking durations and charges “to support local businesses”!

But litter IS a problem and it’s a growing one too.

Litter and waste don’t mean just the occasional fast food wrapper, although they are starting to appear once more.

It means everything from that to fly tipping in the countryside, and now, urinating in our streets.

Twenty-eight-year-old Andrew Banks, from Essex, is into the first of a two-week jail term for urinating adjacent to the Westminster monument to murdered policeman PC Keith Palmer. After downing 16 pints and meeting up with friends, allegedly to ‘protect statues’, Banks very nearly ended up doing the opposite.

Swiftly dealt with by the courts, his actions will now undoubtedly blight the rest of his life, affecting all kinds of areas of it.

If the sentence might seem extreme, the law concerning outraging public decency is no laughing matter and Chief Magistrate Emma Arbuthnot was swift to apply it.

Could it happen here? Of course and the offence already occurs. Like many, I’ve seen it happening in Abington Street and elsewhere; an almost commonplace act, mostly as a result of the night-time economy here.

The same will apply in most towns in the county, I’m sure, as will the littering which is already affecting the area.

During the tightest stage of the lockdown, while most of us were self-isolating and social distancing, nature took the opportunity to re-establish itself. Pollution dropped significantly, as did the littering of our streets and green spaces.

Now, humans are back and so too is the littering. Why should this have to be an inevitability? It’s not because we don’t know not to litter, it’s because of people’s arrogance that it’s ‘somebody else’s job’ to clear up after us.

Rubbish, and I use the word advisedly.

A few days ago I visited Delapre Abbey. The state of the parkland, thanks to the thoughtlessness of people leaving their litter lying around, was simply disgusting, leaving volunteers – whose job is NOT to clear the litter there – to do so.

I’ve heard people saying the same of Abington Park and elsewhere too. Fly tipping is apparently increasing. And, of course, there’s the issue of human waste, thanks to the behaviour of some. Why? Waste – particularly the human kind – is an obvious health hazard, so does it really take a pandemic and the loss of human life from it to provide some respite? Apparently so.

We are on the point of a social restart. If you’re going out for a picnic, plan ahead. Take a bin bag with you for the express purpose of taking your rubbish back home with you. Make it part of the day.

Whether the public bins are full or not, don’t leave your waste there, take it back home so that the people whose job it is to remove your waste, can do so. You pay for it already, so get some value for money.

Wake up!