Chewing gum firms must pay out to clean up streets say councils

CHEWING gum manufacturers were last night facing fresh demands to help pay the multi-million pound bill for scraping it off pavements.

Councils are furious that firms such as Wrigley refuse to contribute to the cost of removing discarded gum from the streets.

Chewing gum is one of the toughest items of waste to remove. It gets trodden into pavements and roads, making it difficult and expensive for cleaners to get rid of the unsightly mess.

A piece of gum costs on average about 3p to buy, but the bill to clear a square metre of pavement is £1.50 – 50 times more.

Now the Local Government Association, which represents more than 370 councils, is demanding gum manufacturers step up to assist in tackling the scourge.

According to the organisation, chewing gum leaves taxpayers with a £60million-ayear problem in England and Wales. The town hall in South Tyneside alone spends £104,000 a year scraping up chewed gum. Because most gum currently sold is not biodegradable, once trodden into a surface it needs specialised equipment to remove.

The call comes after campaign group Keep Britain Tidy found 99 per cent of main shopping streets and 64 per cent of all roads and pavements were stained by gum.

If manufacturers chipped in it would free up extra money for hard-pressed councils to deal with more pressing priorities such as easing the social care crisis or filling in more than a million potholes.

Councillor Judith Blake, the LGA’s environment spokesman, said: ‘At a time when councils face considerable ongoing funding pressures, this is a growing cost pressure they could do without.

‘It is therefore reasonable to expect chewing gum manufacturers to help more, both by switching to biodegradable gum and by contributing to the cost of clearing it up.’ Clive Betts, Labour chairman of the Commons’ Communities and Local Government Select Committee, said: ‘Chewing gum is a significant cost because of the difficulties of getting it off the pavement. There is definitely a case to be made for the manufacturers to contribute to the clean-up costs.

‘They have done precious little to contribute to the costs they impose on the public purse. They should accept they have some responsibility.’ Two years ago, the cross-party committee said that a tax of up to 5p on a packet of chewing gum was necessary to pay to clear up litter linked to the product.

But in 2015, industry evidence to MPs suggested that a chewing gum tax would actually increase litter. Wrigley’s senior corporate affairs manager Alex West argued that a tax ‘would not address the root cause of the problem’.

She said a small financial levy would mean that people would think ‘the clean-up is being paid for’ and therefore ‘incentivise people further to drop it because they think it is OK to do that’.