Residents and members of the borough's Citizens' Panel tell the council that street scene services are very important to them. The Street Scene strategy aims to make Wigan Borough a more attractive place to live and work, ensuring the local environment is neat, tidy and well maintained. The team are responsible for high profile campaigns, such as "Kick Litter into Touch", "Wigan Borough in Bloom", education projects and activities such as bulb planting, litter picks and local environmental improvement works.
Campaigns
You may have seen our recent campaigns, such as Kick Litter into Touch, new "stubber plates" on litter bins for cigarettes, and the "Cleaner Greener Borough" initiative. We have also worked with local and community groups to plant thousands of trees, bulbs and plants around the borough to enhance the local environment.
Dropping litter is an offence. Offenders over 11 years of age will incur a fixed penalty of £50. The council's street cleaners collect over 5600 tonnes of litter from the streets of the borough each year. During visits to Wigan and Leigh in Autumn 2006, over 40 people were stopped for dropping litter on the streets.
As well as the £50 fixed penalty notices, a letter was also sent to the parents of a 14 year old youth for littering. The council takes the issue of young people and litter very seriously. The Street Scene team regularly visits schools to take lessons and lead young people in environmental projects around their school grounds.
Dog faeces are classed as litter. They can cause an infection (called Toxocariasis) that may affect human health. In Wigan Borough it is an offence not to clean up if your dog fouls. Offences are subject to a fixed penalty fine of £50 and, for non payment, prosecution and a fine of up to £1000.
A Cleaner Greener Borough
Recent campaigns have sought to improve the environmental quality of our area. We have worked with community groups, individual volunteers and schools to plant hundreds of thousands of crocus and daffodil bulbs, as well as providing new trees and public art.
The team works with the government's Single Regeneration Budget panel to apply for invesment and grants to improve areas of the borough, working alongside local people and addressing their requests through meetings and consultation.
We would be delighted to hear from you or your group if you want to litter pick your local area or organise an environmental improvement.
We also work closely with groups such as EnCams (External link) (formerly the Tidy Britain Group) to improve the local environment.
