Litter problem on Barry Island is ‘price of success’

CAMPAIGNERS and businesses have spoken out about the “heartbreaking’” amount of litter strewn across Barry beach – and what they want done about it.

The beach hit headlines again over the early May bank holiday weekend as mounds of rubbish were left by visitors.

A summit was held on Thursday for community groups, residents, traders and councillors to come up with ideas on how to keep the coastline tidy in the future.

Rob Thomas, managing director at Vale of Glamorgan Council, which hosted the summit at the Royal National Lifeboat Institution Visitor Centre at Barry Island, said the beach is not unique in having problems with litter.

“This is not a problem which is unique to Barry,” he said. “Other beaches have faced the same issue.

“Barry does have an issue with it, but so do a lot of places.”

Mr Thomas said a lot of money has been invested in Barry beach in recent years – leading to growing visitor numbers.

He said: “We have a full events programme every year which brings people on to the island. We have invested in the promenade and eastern prom in recent years.

“We’re seeing huge numbers coming to the island doing regular business.

“The price of success is the fact that we do have this problem to deal with.”

Rob Curtis, from Friends of Barry Beaches, said no-one is blaming the council as it is “part of the answer” to the issue.

He said: “It’s apathy. Even after all this education, people are still leaving rubbish on the beach. It’s heartbreaking.”

Volunteers often have to give up part of their bank holidays to clean up after littering beach-goers, the meeting heard.

Aoife Blight, who runs Zero Waste Cardiff, a campaign to reduce waste in the Vale of Glamorgan, said: “People don’t realise they’re littering half the time. This is not a unique thing to Barry. This is everywhere.

“We want to take back the narrative and change our town because we care. We want this to be a nice place for everyone – we all need to get involved.”

Joanne Cheek, from community group Beautiful Barry, said many residents of the town avoid the beach on sunny days.

“The majority of people are coming not from here,” she said.

“If they come from the city, they turn up and assume it’s cleaned.”

She added: “We can’t expect the people of Barry to clean the beach because of other people.”

Mr Curtis said: “Chip cartons are one of the worst things. They can’t even be recycled. It’s absolutely appalling. Traders have a big role to play.”

Mrs Blight suggested that incentives should be used to stop people littering – one idea was to give free cups of coffee to people who collect bags of litter.

“We could encourage people to do it for positive reasons,” she said.

Other ideas from the meeting included having people to greet those coming on to the beach and handing out litter bags, issuing on-the-spot fines and using CCTV to identify offenders.

Currently, 144 litter bins are in use across Whitmore Bay, and the council can collect up to five tonnes of waste on busy days – when up to 30,000 people can visit the beach.

Councillor John Thomas, leader of Vale of Glamorgan Council, said: “It’s not a Barry issue, it’s an issue in areas similar to Barry Island. We would like to rise above it if we can.

“It’s about trying to educate the day visitors. It’s not acceptable to leave the rubbish about. We need to make the facilities available to them to dispose of the rubbish in a proper way.

“There’s no point putting 500 bins on the island which for most of the year noone is going to use.

“It’s not a money issue. It’s a logistics issue.

“I just can’t believe people would leave rubbish behind.

“I think it’s all about education, then enforcement as a last resort.”