Bags of litter piled up after clean-up organised by Barnet Residents Association – and the town’s MP is urging more community action
Litters pickers from Barnet Residents Association fanned out across the town in one of the association’s regular clean ups – the kind of initiative which the Chipping Barnet MP Dan Tomlinson hopes will be encouraged by his new community action network.
Association co-chair Ken Rowland and committee member Emma Morgan – see above – cleared up litter in Bruce Road which backs on to the Waitrose car park and often gets overlooked in street cleaning.
However, they left Bruce Road feeling rather disappointed because they were not equipped to tackle a heap of builder’s rubbish which had been left by a recent fly-tipper.
Committee member Anna Watkins was on hand at the association’s stall in The Spires shopping centre ready to hand volunteers litter pickers and rubbish bags which had been supplied by Barnet Council.
The clean up was organised in partnership with the Chipping Barnet Town Team and was considered a great success – a heap of around 40 rubbish bags was left nearby at Chipping Barnet Library in Stapylton Road ready for collection by the council’s refuse service.
Among the volunteers were staff members from McDonald’s fast-food restaurant who also stage their own litter pick sessions.
Franchisee Hubs Backshi (above, second from left) said McDonald’s team members regularly did a litter sweep around the restaurant in the Barnet High Street and were keen to help whenever street clean-ups were organised.
Litter picking was one of the targets discussed at a meeting organised by the Chipping Barnet MP Dan Tomlinson which went on to establish a community action network.
Over 200 people attended a discussion and workshop where an agenda was established for action next year.
Long-term projects include supporting East Barnet Festival and Community Energy Barnet.
Mr Tomlinson said he hoped the network could run a monthly community cation day.
“The focus of the network is making tangible differences to the local area through local action, whether that’s litter picking or organising a community festival,” said Mr Tomlinson.
Tags: #Barnet Council #Barnet High Street #Chipping Barnet #High Barnet #People And Personalities
4 thoughts on “Bags of litter piled up after clean-up organised by Barnet Residents Association – and the town’s MP is urging more community action”
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‘Among the volunteers were staff members from McDonald’s fast-food restaurant who also stage their own litter pick sessions. … McDonald’s team members regularly did a litter sweep around the restaurant in the Barnet High Street and were keen to help whenever street clean-ups were organised.’
Why are we allowing McDonald’s to greenwash their image? Do we not know the ecological problems they have caused?
https://news.mongabay.com/2017/10/amazon-deforestation-linked-to-mcdonalds-and-british-retail-giants/
All this is on the part of McDonalds is a greenwashing operation, make no mistake.
Do you think they really care about litter? They wouldn’t be in the fast food business producing disposable packaging if they did.
What do you get if you go into a greasy spoon café? Food on a plate.
What do you get if you go into McDonald’s? Food in packaging, regardless of whether you want to eat in or take away.
Now tell me what the solution is: eliminating the packaging or performative litter picks?
This is the problem with our capitalist society: we will entertain performative nonsense, like carbon offsetting, and McDonald’s litter picks, but not tackle the root of the problem, because it will undermine the very machinery of the corrupt economic structure we live under, and we are afraid it will come crashing down over our heads.
Very well done to everyone involved in this initiative! Also, particularly good to see McDonald’s staff taking part too. Now, come on Waitrose, I have twice reported one of your abandoned trolleys in the bushes of the Byng Road car park and, judging by the indifference of the response to my telephone calls, it is going to stay there. It must be annoying to Waitrose staff that customers do this to their trolleys, but my view is that they have an obligation to collect them before they become yet another item of abandoned rusting junk.
Well said.
In addition, will this ‘Community Action Network’ encourage people to oppose projects such as the proposed datacentre south of Potters Bar that is covered in another article in this publication, or will it only promote politically impotent activity that is acceptable to the authorities (given that the government encourages the building of such datacentres – and therefore that opposing them is inherently political)?
(While litter-picking and the like is obviously a good thing, we don’t need an MP to tell us to do it – and if people do, that says more about their passivity and lack of initiative than anything else.)
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/21/angela-rayner-hit-with-legal-challenge-over-datacentre-on-green-belt-land
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jan/12/mainlined-into-uks-veins-labour-announces-huge-public-rollout-of-ai
It’s a rare day when a camera lens doesn’t find Dan T, so one can only assume he found a more “grid-worthy” backdrop elsewhere this weekend.
Our MP has mastered the art of the “victory lap” for work he didn’t do—be it a landlord’s fresh coat of paint or a post office that serves the UOE’s bottom line—yet he’s developed a sudden case of stage fright regarding the High Barnet high-rise and our shrinking Green Belt.
He championed a parking scheme that is currently suffocating Mays Lane businesses as a community win, but don’t expect a follow-up visit; he’s likely taking cues from the Chancellor on how to best ignore the plight of small business owners.
It’s a pity Labour traded Emma Whysall’s years of groundwork for a Blair-lite tribute act who seems to have misplaced his constituent’s contact details.