‘Tax chewing gum to cover cost of cleaning up streets’

 A chewing gum tax should be introduced to help pay to clean up streets, the Local Government Association has said.

A cross-party motion has been tabled along with a petition asking the Government to crack down on the “nuisance and unsightly blight”. Councils spend £60 million a year scraping up two million pieces, dropped daily. The campaign is backed by the LGA and campaign group Clean Up Britain, which has called for chewing gum makers to be legally forced to help pay for the problem. Gum is the second most commonly dropped litter after cigarette butts.