'Abandoned beach litter took us two days to clear'

Tents, towels, wet wipes and children's clothing were among hundreds of items left behind by people who visited a Wirral beach, a volunteer group says.

They said it took them more than two days to clear New Brighton beach after thousands visited the resort on bank holiday Monday.

Steve Taylor, of community group The New Brighteners, said bins had been left overflowing and urged people to be more responsible. "It was the worst I've seen for some time," he said. "Massive volumes of litter, tents, towels, clothes, a gazebo frame, bottles, cans, millions of wet wipes and endless beach toys were abandoned on the sand."

Wirral Council, which manages the town's bins, has been asked for comment.

There are five large bins at Fort Perch Rock car park but they did not have the capacity to deal with the litter and street bins filled up quickly and were left overflowing.

"The great majority of people will dispose of the rubbish in a considerate way," Taylor said, "but it gets to a point on weekends like we just had, where it is simply in quantities beyond the capacity of all our volunteers to deal with it.

"It is just becoming ridiculous."

Visitors and local businesses agreed it was "up to everyone" to keep the beach clean and be responsible for their own litter.

"If we want to go to nice places, we've got to keep them clean," Harry, who was visiting the beach for the day from Runcorn, said.

"Its pure laziness at the end of the day," said fellow beach-goer Deb.

Jo, who was visiting the beach with her young family, added: "If you're going to bring your lunch to the beach, you should clean up after yourselves."

Among the rubbish left on the beach on Monday were many takeaway wrappers, which local takeaway owner Dawn, from Dawn's Burgers, said was "absolutely crazy".

"I have never seen anything like it in 38 years of being in business," she said.

"It was just all over the floor, everywhere.

"People should know that you put your litter in the bin, you know, they're not children. We can't tell them to put the stuff in the bin, can we?"

She also said that public bins were not emptied throughout the day, which had added to the problem.

"When I was going home at 11 o'clock that night the bins were all full."

She added those responsible for the bins, the council, could do "their part as well and come around on busy days like that, it's a shared responsibility".