On 26th April, supporters of Penistone Carry-A-Bag trawling for litter waded into the River Don and worked along about 300m of its banks at Springvale. We found 112 plastic carrier bags and 20 bin bags full of other rubbish which was mostly other plastic waste. We thank Barnsley MBC’s Neighbourhood Pride team who provided bags, litter pickers and gloves.
At their March meeting, Penistone Town Council agreed to support Penistone Carry-A-Bag in principle (see our News item about it). In their April meeting, they very generously agreed to make a donation of £500 towards the scheme. Thank-you! We are not far off our fundraising total now - please contact us if you know of a local business who could help us out!
Many residents and traders joined us at our public meeting on 7th April. Members of Penistone Carry-A-Bag explained the plans for reducing plastic bags and the Co-op offered their help.
A representative from 'Global packaging' explained all about alternatives to plastic bags and representatives from BMBC talked about plastics recycling and how they could help.
Everyone at the meeting agreed to support the scheme.
At our public meeting, the Co-operative announced that they will be providing us with 6000 of their Fairtrade fabric carriers, one for each household in the Penistone area. This is on top of a grant for £500 they have given us for other Carry-A-Bag costs. A big thank-you goes to the Co-operative for their very generous support!
On Monday 17th March, Helen and Rachel went along to a Penistone Town council meeting to present the Carry-A-Bag project and to ask for support. They emptied out 230 carrier bags, which is the average amount used by a person in a year. They are pictured here with the Mayor, Joe Unsworth, after the Town Council agreed to support the scheme.
Nine out of ten people surveyed in Penistone town centre said they supported the idea of reducing plastic bag use in Penistone.
Four out of ten Penistone Shoppers already Carry-a-Bag