That this House notes the disgusting mess that discarded chewing gum makes of streets in the UK; further notes the financial burden this blight has on local authorities; and calls on the Government to introduce a levy on every pack of chewing gum sold with the revenue being given to local authorities in order to cover the cost of cleaning up this unsightly mess.He's only got two signatures so far, no Tories in there. Next they will calling for public warnings taking up two thirds of the chewing gum packet saying how nasty it is! Unfortunately for Crausby even cleaning up the chewing gum probably wouldn't make Bolton (his constituency) look any nicer.. after all it's north of Watford which makes it a borderline developing nation right?*
* "Top Tory slates northern town" would be my preferred headline on Lib Dem and Labour blogs please. Along with how I'm out of touch and probably torture small animals.
6 comments:
...and calls on the Government to introduce a levy on every pack of chewing gum sold with the revenue being given to local authorities in order to cover the cost of cleaning up this unsightly mess.
Giving the money raised to local authorities? I think hell will freeze over before Gordo did that. It might help if local authorities simply got the grant settlement they should get in the first place, rather than be forced to do more with less money.
What would be novel would be a Labour MP tabling a motion that calls for local authorities NOT to be financially penalised for undertaking proper planning consultations, rather than rubber stamping them within the time period set by Whitehall, regardless of the effect on residents.
I agree with this proposal and wrote about it on ConservativeHome a while back. Gum is one of the great banes of urban living and has loads of external costs, not just in terms street cleaning: try getting the stuff off your suit trousers.
The proposal provoked some bizarre responses though... one commenter said that would be a stealth tax (bad) and it would be better to ban it altogether!
(For ref: http://tinyurl.com/23p8zk)
The first sense to come from a Labour politician. More power to his elbow.
I'm instinctively against banning things, but one thing I'd outlaw is gum.
Taxing gum alleviates the symptom not the underlying cause. The problem is that people don't care enough about their streets to find a bin.
It all leads straight back to the idea that "I can do what I like because someone else will pick up the pieces" which is such a force in this country today.
Chewing gum litter originates in our schools, because we have failed to educate our children not to "gumspit". A chewing gum tax would help to clean footpaths and schoolgrounds of filthy chewing gum litter, but unless we can get the message accross to our kids, it will keep returning.
Chewing gum litter has increased alarmingly since smokers have been forced outside. Not content to pollute our oceans with butts, feral smokers now contaminate our footpaths with filthy discarded gum.
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