Volunteers' Week 2024: Meet the Volunteers

Keep Britain Tidy today joins thousands of charities and voluntary organisations across the nation in thanking our army of volunteers and recognising their contribution to protecting the environment.??

Volunteers’ Week takes place in the first week of June every year and is a chance to recognise the fantastic contribution volunteers make to our communities and thank them.??

To mark Volunteers’ Week’s 40th anniversary, we’ve put together this piece highlighting some of the wonderful volunteers who go above and beyond all year round to protect the environment on their doorsteps.??

The impact of our almost 200 #LitterHeroes Ambassadors is monumental. One such ambassador is Michael Pearson who has been leading St Annes North Beach Care in Lancashire for seven years.??

Blackpool born Michael’s fascination with the coast and the wonders of local beaches ensured that he was frequently out walking and picking up litter.??

St Annes North Beach Care covers a beautiful two miles of coastline popular with locals, tourists, kite-surfers and dog-walkers, and thanks to Michael and his fellow volunteers, it remains a beautifully clean beach to visit.??

Meticulously organised, Michael weighs the group’s bags each week, and since April 2018, the group has collected an enormous nine tonnes of litter.??

He even came up with his own recycling scheme to benefit local children. During summer, the group salvages plastic buckets, spades and toys found on the beach, cleans them, and then donates them to local charities working with children.??

Emily Parr, #LitterHeroes Programme Manager at Keep Britain Tidy, said: “Michael has been an incredible group leader, a brilliant friend to many volunteers and his impact on the local coastline has been incredible. He truly deserves all this praise as without his passion, dedication and knowledge, St Annes Beach would look very different. Thank you for everything Michael, you are a wonderful #LitterHeroes Ambassador!”

It’s not just individual litter-pickers like Michael making a difference. Groups like the Halstead Conservation Group in Essex are also coming together to protect local beauty spots, like Coggeshall Pieces Nature Reserve.??

Local volunteers adopted the wonderful green oasis on the outskirts of Halstead and over the past 20 years have renovated a series of interconnected ponds which now characterise the site.??

They meet once a month to plant trees and hedges, build and maintain bat and bird boxes, and have recently started to convert an area of grassland to a wildflower meadow.??

They plant native trees and hedges which benefit wildlife and provide safe green pathways to the ponds. During the autumn and winter, their volunteering focus turns to creating log piles and making snug winter hibernacula - places where amphibians and reptiles can survive the winter - using sticks, raked leaves and turf, and the group also build dead hedges with leftover branches to allow small mammals to feel safe moving about the reserve. All this work is carried out by hand without the use of machinery.?

RiverCare and BeachCare Programme Officer David Wallace praised the group, saying: “The Halstead Conservation Group is a shining example of community engagement, and they always welcome new members with a cup of tea and some home baked biscuits!”?

Barbara (or Barbi) Gooding runs the Sincil Bank RiverCare and Litter-Pick Group.??

Sincil Bank is an area of terraced houses sitting alongside the Sincil Drain and forms the approach to the Lincoln City FC LNER stadium.??

Barbi has run this group since 2016, bringing together a network of over 500 locals of all ages and abilities, to keep the drain (and surrounding streets) free from litter.??

Over the years, Barbi’s group of volunteers have become expert trolley collectors, often managing to collect up to five trolleys from the local area during each pick.??

The area also saw issues with littering on match days so in 2019, Barbi worked with the City of Lincoln Council and Lincoln City Foundation, to arrange the delivery of Match Day Bins to residents along the Sincil Drain. These bins are put out by residents on match day and are then collected by the local authority waste team on the next bin day. This successful collaboration has seen a reduction in the amount of littering happening because of LNER stadium use.??

“We are incredibly proud of the hard work Barbi put into this impactful litter reduction campaign,” RiverCare & BeachCare Programme Officer Sally Bird told us, adding: “Barbi's warm and supportive personality spills into all her events, creating a genuine friendship and sense of community amongst her volunteers.”?

Small business owner Ado Shorland is another volunteer who uses his spare time to protect the environment.??

He has been running a Keep Britain Tidy supported beach-cleaning group since 2011. When he started, he organised a clean-up weekend on his local beaches that collected over 100 bags of plastic. Now, his local beaches are much cleaner due to the work of his team of volunteers.??

He also plays a key role in helping to maintain the Blue Flag Award at Widemouth Bay. As well as operating local beach cleans as part of the beach management group, he does numerous British Divers Marine Life Rescues on the bay and carries out sand dune restoration work.??

In previous years, he has even rallied local businesses to help fund the Blue Flag and Seaside Award applications, which are now paid for by Cornwall Council.??

Ocean Recovery Project Manager Neil Hembrow said: “The local beaches are much cleaner these days, due to the collective work of his group and others.”?

Keep Britain Tidy CEO, Allison Ogden-Newton said: “I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all the incredible volunteers that work with us. Your commitment and your passion inspires us all and makes a huge difference to the work that we do. Thank you.”?

There are many ways to get involved with Keep Britain Tidy as a volunteer.??

Keep Britain Tidy has recently opened up applications to become a #LitterHeroes Ambassador. We are looking for exceptional group leaders, already running volunteer groups and hosting regular litter-picking events within their local communities.?

You can apply to join the programme here.??