Today was
Clean Up Australia Day and many thousands of volunteers around the country gave up a couple of hours of their time to make it a better, cleaner country. This is an annual event that began in Sydney in 1989 and has now spread around the country.
Below is the Glebe, Sydney, NSW contingent who cleaned up Glebe's Sydney Harbour foreshore parks: Bicentennial Park, Federal Park, Jubilee Park, Pope Paul Reserve and Blackwattle Bay Park, which are really all one big park.
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| Clean Up Australia Team Glebe |
The wonderful fire-fighters at the Glebe fire station joined Team Glebe while remaining on call. (As far as we know, no houses burned down while they helped out.)
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| Jeroen explaining the finer points of picking up rubbish |
Jeroen, was this year's organiser. He also organises his own monthly clean-up of the public spaces around Glebe.
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| A cleaner Rozelle Bay |
There is a program to regenerate the mangroves that once lined the Glebe foreshore. You can see it in its early stages to the right of the breakwater.
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| An thinly-veiled excuse to show myself doing something useful. |
Flotsam is a problem. Litter from the land areas can be kept under control but every time the tide comes in the rubbish that's thrown off boats comes ashore.
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| Thirty two good reasons for container deposit legislation |
If you're a drinks producer you won't want to hear this but container deposit legislation would greatly reduce rubbish. South Australia and the Northern Territory are the only places in Australia with bottle deposit laws. We need a national law but there is strong lobbying against it.
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| Two ecstatic members of Clean Up Australia Team Glebe showing off part of the haul. |
It is amazing what an impact some volunteers can make. So put it in your diary for next year and join the fun. You will feel suitably virtuous for ages afterwards---and guilty if you don't.
Plus you'll get a certificate like this. How good is that?
