20,000 SPRING CLEAN HEROES ALREADY!

Legions of you join big litter clear-up... just 48 hours after Mail’s call for action

THE Great British Spring Clean has got off to a fantastic start with more than 20,000 people signing up to be litter heroes.

The amazing support eclipses even last year’s remarkable launch when 14,000 signed up in the first two days.

This year’s event, once again supported by the Daily Mail and organised by Keep Britain tidy, received the blessing of religious

leaders including those of the Church of England and Muslim Council of Britain.

Nicholas Holtam, the Bishop of Salisbury, said: ‘I’m delighted to support the Daily Mail’s campaign. We all want to care for God’s creation and clean up the Earth.

‘Churches are at the heart of communities across the country and can help to lead initiatives to collect litter and encourage people to think carefully about reducing, reusing and recycling waste.’

Harun Khan, of the Muslim Council of Britain, said : ‘It is the responsibility of all of us to preserve our environment and make the world a cleaner place.

‘Muslims are taught by Prophet Muhammad that “cleanliness is half of faith”, so the Muslim Council of Britain is pleased to be encouraging our members to get involved again with Keep Britain Tidy’s Great British Spring Clean campaign.’

Allison Ogden-Newton, of Keep Britain Tidy, said she was overwhelmed with the scale of the response and reported that more than 326 clean-ups had already been set up, from Cornwall to Northumbria and Liverpool to Folkestone.

She added: ‘Thank you to everyone who has already pledged to do their bit and, to those who haven’t yet, please support the Great British Spring Clean and help us show the world that we should all love where we live.’

Boris Johnson has backed the campaign, urging everyone to roll up their sleeves and join with friends, family and neighbours to pick up litter.

The much-loved children’s TV characters the Wombles, who cleaned up Wimbledon Common in the children’s TV series, have come out of hibernation to help. Last year’s event resulted in an incredible 563,163 people volunteering – the largest mass environmental action ever seen in the UK. An amazing 4,308 tons of rubbish were collected – making for nearly a million bags of litter. The helpers included 175,055 schoolchildren.

This year the Daily Mail is urging its army of big-hearted readers and their friends and families to make the 2020 Spring Clean the biggest ever. While the official target is 600,000 volunteers, we aim to go way beyond this – aiming for one million in total.

The Spring Clean is made possible thanks to headline partners Co-op, Mars Wrigley, Red Bull and Wilko and is supported by players of the People’s Postcode Lottery. The campaign is also supported by Clear Channel, Coca- Cola, Pepsi Max and Walkers.

Steve Murrells, chief executive of Co-op, said: ‘ This is such a great campaign because it doesn’t just mean less litter on the streets, it actually encourages communities to come together in looking after local spaces.

‘Of course as a retailer the Co-op also has a responsibility to help prevent littering by cutting down on plastic packaging and helping people recycle more. That’s why we’ve committed to make all our packaging easy to recycle by this summer.’

The Daily Mail has long campaigned against the plastic rubbish polluting the land and sea and harming wildlife.

Thousands of animals turn up at sanctuaries every year having swallowed plastic or some other waste or having been trapped or cut by discarded materials.

The Great British Spring Clean takes place between Friday, March 20, and Monday, April 13. To get involved go to: www.gbspringclean.org

SINCE he was swept to power six weeks ago on a wave of optimism and goodwill, prime ministerial life for Boris Johnson has been something of a breeze.

After demolishing the Labour ‘Red Wall’ to secure a landslide majority, he has been roundly lauded as the saviour of both his party and the country.

Abroad, world leaders have been queueing up to be his friend. At home, the official Opposition is imploding in an orgy of bitterness and post-election recrimination.

To cap it all, on Friday a beaming Boris signed the EU Withdrawal Agreement, making good his mantric election pledge to ‘get Brexit done’.

Indeed, life has been so relaxed that he even found time for a getaway to the A-list island playground of Mustique.

This week, however, the honeymoon period comes to an abrupt end. Hard decisions must be made, which will inevitably make some people angry and upset.

Mr Johnson’s political mettle will be tested to the limit.

First he must decide whether to allow Chinese technology giant Huawei to work on Britain’s 5G mobile network.

Despite assurances from intelligence chiefs that the company would be excluded from sensitive ‘core’ areas, many still believe any involvement would be a massive security risk.

Senior US officials say letting China into the system would be ‘nothing short of madness’ and are threatening to halt intelligence sharing.

If Mr Johnson says no to Huawei, he offends the Chinese and slows down development of 5G. If he says yes, he puts the Special Relationship in jeopardy.

Both countries will, of course, be vital trading partners in our post-Brexit future, complicating the issue still further.

Secondly, he must decide whether to go ahead with HS2, despite the estimated cost trebling to £100billion – and the fact that it cuts a much-resented swathe through Tory heartlands.

Scrapping or diluting the scheme, even if the money is used to upgrade our existing crumbling network, would infuriate Northern voters who helped put him in Downing Street.

Pressing on would enrage some of his traditional supporters, and leave him open to accusations of being profligate with taxpayers’ money.

Meanwhile, the Grenfell fire inquiry – at which Westminster’s Tory council is firmly in the dock – resumes today.

And on Friday we formally leave the EU, sounding the starting gun on what promise to be thorny negotiations on creating a free-trade agreement.

If he didn’t know it already, Mr Johnson is about to learn there is more to leading the country than speeches about boosterism. The hard graft starts here. Decisions he makes in the coming days will reverberate for years to come. They must be clear, joined up and part of a cogent plan to take this country forward.

We know Mr Johnson to be a man of wit, charm and intelligence. We will soon find out whether he is also a statesman.