Bin your butts! There is no excuse for littering

Photo opportunity 1pm, Old Market Square

Nottingham City Council is reminding smokers they must dispose of their cigarette waste responsibly as 1 July looms.

Cigarette butts, matches and packaging are already the most common type of street litter. According to Chris Bailey, head of Street Scene, the concern is that as more smokers go outside to smoke, there will be an increase in the amount of street litter.

Chris is keen to remind people that dropping cigarette butts is likely to result in a £75 Fixed Penalty Notice fine. “We are taking this issue very seriously and have a range of proactive measures in place to ensure everyone in Nottingham can dispose of their cigarette waste appropriately.

“Cigarette butts leach poisons and take many years to decompose. They definitely do count as litter and if you drop them on the floor you may well get fined,” he said.

To make things easier for smokers, the City Council is working with many of the city’s pubs to ensure that smokers will be able to ditch their smoking litter on the premises. Pubs are also helping the City Council to distribute environmentally friendly ‘Stubbi’ pocket ashtrays (pouches).

Mike Meehan, Vice Chairman of Pub Watch said its members have been happy to help the City Council distribute the pouches at pubs across the City. “It is great to see the City Council’s proactive stance on litter issues and we are happy to be helping. I am confident that the public will also understand our members’ new responsibilities come 1 July,” he said.

With Stubbi pocket ashtrays all smokers need to do is put their cigarette butts into the environmentally friendly pouches and when full drop their Stubbi into the next convenient bin.

Additionally, to ensure all smokers can get rid of their cigarette butts in the right way the City Council has also recently installed 1000 new litterbins all over the city. There are now more than 2000 city litterbins so you are sure to find one when you need it!

Mr Binme, a walking cigarette stub will be in the Old Market Square on Friday from 12noon – 2pm. Along with other staff from the City Council, Mr Binme will be handing out 1000 pocket ashtrays to promote the anti-litter message.

Stubbies can also be obtained by emailing bigspringclean@nottinghamcity.gov.uk or by visiting the City Council’s contact centre on Burton Street – on a first come first served basis.

Any organisations seeking advice and support can download a copy of the implementation pack from www.nottinghamcity.gov.uk/smokefreetoolkit or call 0115 9156446 for advice.

Signs and explanations of the law are also available from the Government’s website, www.gosmokefree.co.uk, and www.cleanairaward.org.uk.