Fife Teens Take On Litterbugs

Two teenagers from Dunfermline have joined the battle against litter and fly-tipping.

Rory McLaren (16) and Ross Murray (15) have spent the past year on a panel of young people as part of Generation Change - a group selected by Young Scot and Zero Waste Scotland.

Research published by the projected today shows 40 per cent of young people would pick up litter they saw someone else drop, and 45% claim they've never littered themselves - but only 32 per cent believe most littering and fly-tipping is due to laziness.

The panel has been meeting regularly over the past year to conduct research and discuss ways of combating the problem of littering and fly-tipping, particularly among young people in Scotland. The group revealed their research at an enlightening event at Glasgow’s Lighthouse Centre this week, where they also presented their recommendations and unveiled prototypes developed to tackle the problem.

One of the ideas which Rory and Ross helped develop is a phone app which would tell users where to find their nearest litter bin.

Ross told Kingdom FM News he joined the project to make Scotland "a better and tidier place for future generations - so they don't grow up in a country where it's full of litter and no-one has any respect for the environment."

The teenagers said they'd enjoyed working with youngsters from other parts of the country.

Rory said: "There's a lot of different ideas because we've all got different experiences.  Every school's different obviously so coming from different schools, different councils is a big factor in our ideas.
 
The group will now put together a report about their solutions which will be presented to the Scottish Government in early 2016. The findings and ideas will influence Scotland's future environmental policy.
 
Young Scot Chief Executive, Louise Macdonald, praised the group's work and said: "We’re confident that they'll now be able to go into their communities and spread the word of how to keep Scotland clean. It's hugely important and valuable research."

Her thoughts were echoed by the Chief Executive of  Zero Waste Scotland, Iain Gulland, who said: "We’re delighted to support this fantastic initiative to stop littering and fly-tipping in Scotland. Although it's a minority of young people who litter in Scotland, the group are doing a fine job to change this behaviour. We're looking forward to seeing their work develop and help us encourage every person across Scotland to think twice before littering."