The three main towns in Co Tipperary experienced contrasting fortunes in the IBAL Anti Litter League Final Results for 2009, when the annual survey of 60 towns and cities in Ireland was published yesterday. Thurles town is ranked 34th of the 60 towns and cities in the IBAL League, with Clonmel ranking 4th and Nenagh still deemed ‘littered’ and in 53rd position.
Clonmel has moved up the ranks this year from “Moderately Littered” to “Clean to European Norms”, while Thurles dropped four places in the rankings, but still remains “Clean to European Norms” nationally.
The number of “Clean to European Norms” areas nationwide hit a record high of 41 last year, however this list was reduced to 39 in the 2009 survey just published.
Speaking to local authority representatives at a ceremony in Dublin this morning, Dr Tomas Cavanagh of Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) stated:
“Cutbacks in budgets should not mean a reversal of the progress made on litter. New cleaning technologies and effective enforcement could yield tremendous benefit at minimum cost. In particular we need to rid ourselves of the idea that ‘enforcement’ is about fining an individual for dropping a sweet wrapper. It’s more about taking local businesses and other organisations to task for not keeping the areas outside their premises free of litter – areas such as car parks and pavements. If local authorities aren’t comfortable with this, maybe privatisation should be considered.”
Liberty Square Thurles
He congratulated the local authorities for helping transform our environment in the space of just seven short years.
Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) was set up in 1996 as an alliance of companies who believe that litter has a significant impact on our economic well-being. The main sources of our prosperity – tourism, Foreign Direct Investment and our food industries – all depend on an image of Ireland as a clean and green island. We are now a high-cost destination for visitors, who deserve first-class standards of cleanliness.
Sites are graded by An Taisce according to international standards.
Thurles Councillor, Solicitor Gerard O’Brien said he was very pleased with the ‘ Litter Free Status” afforded Thurles in this survey, blaming the very necessary upgrading of roads and footpaths throughout the town, during the past year, for the slight drop in the Thurles rankings. He further stated that Thurles Council were fully committed to keeping Thurles a ‘Litter Free Zone’ and congratulated all the staff responsible, for their tremendous support, working as they did, under extremely difficult conditions, during this period of upheaval within the town.
His remarks were echoed by Thurles Mayor Mrs Evelyn Nevin who again congratulated all those concerned, stating “Our tourist and food sectors in particular owe a debt of gratitude to those involved in making our town ‘litter-free”.
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