About Us
We are a group of volunteers who meet regularly to pick up litter in our local area of Spelthorne, The group was founded during lockdown in 2020 and has grown rapidly - it now has over 950 members. The group is led by a group of four trustees, who work closely with a team of 13 area representatives (one in each ward of the borough), the local council's Neighbourhood Services team and the borough's councillors. It is funded by small grants from the local authority, councillors' grant funding and occasional donations from business. The trustees also give talks for local organisations, including the Rotary and the WI, to raise awareness of the issues affecting the local area.
The group encourages young people to get involved by supporting local schools, Scout and Guide groups and Duke of Edinburgh award scheme participants with information and equipment. It also supports local businesses by providing opportunities for community volunteering through litter picking, lending pickers and hi vis vests, providing risk assessments and bags for collecting rubbish.
As the Borough of Spelthorne has several waterways within its boundaries, there is a separate sister group called 'Waterway Pickers Staines' who organise picks and conservation work in and around theThames, the Colne, the Ash and the Wraysbury rivers, with advice and support from Waterways England, Thames 21 and the Colne Valley Group. The main group has supported this enterprise by gaining funding to provide equipment for use in events led by volunteers who have been trained as River Action Group Leaders. As a result of vigorous campaigning by the Trustees, the local branch of Marks and Spencer has been persuaded to fit and use coin locks to their trolley to avoid them being abandoned around the town or thrown into rivers and streams.
Spelthorne Litter Pickers have raised concerns about the alarming rate of NOS usage in the borough and after gathering data for a year on the number of NOS cylinders being found. As a result, there is now a Public Space Protection Order in Spelthorne which makes it an offence to be using NOS in a public area. In addition, the NOS cylinders found by the group are now collected by the local authority and sent for recycling to raise funds for drug awareness work.
One recent success has been the identification by one of the group's Trustees of an alleyway which was very overgrown and in which a number of 'drug dens' had been created directly next to a local school. As a result of a video report she made, two local councillors took up the concern and the alleyway has now been cleared and made safe for local schoolchildren to use. It is hoped that it will now become the focus of a rural regeneration project to make it a safe and attractive pathway for community use.
Press releases
Legendary Litter Picker crowned Environment Champion for Spelthorne
Spelthorne Litter Pickers volunteer Neil Maitland Walker has been presented with the award for Environment Champion 2023 , at the Spelthorne... read more
06.06.2023 • By Spelthorne Litter Pickers
