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Rubbish row paper chase

By MIKE SIVIER

IS this the way we welcome people to Dursley?

Rubbish is clogging up the area around the bus station - a wave of filth that could be the first thing visitors get to see of the town.

Rick Sainty, of the neighbouring Old Spot Inn, has swept around the front of his pub and the bus station about once a week for the last three or four years.

But now he and his wife Eleanor have launched a campaign to find out who should be doing the job.

He said: "We've spent quite some time now, trying to find out who's supposed to be doing it because of the amount of rubbish piling up.

"The number of people my wife has been ringing to say how filthy it is out there, is incredible.

"If you could only see the filth that is out there - it's appalling and I'm not prepared to deal with what's out there now."

Eleanor Sainty's bid to find who should clean up the mess has turned into something of a paper chase itself:

> Badgerline, who run the bus station, said a company called Adshel is supposed to clean the area.

> Adshel said they don't go that far, try the district council - and gave Eleanor a number in Thombury.

> But South Gloucestershire Council does not deal with Dursley. Officers gave Eleanor a number for Gloucestershire County Council - where the man she needed to talk to was out.

She said: "Anyone getting off at the station might think they had missed a stop and gone to Beirut.

"We try to keep our corner of the town looking tidy, but when it gets to the amount out there now, it's ridiculous. Thankfully it's nothing from the pub."

Carlos Novoth, speaking for Stroud District Council, said: "We are going to have to research who actually owns the depot.

"Then we can put pressure on them to clean up the area - we're quite happy to do that.

"The people who own the land have to be made to do the work themselves."

CAPTION: Ric Sainty of the Old Spot public house in Durlsey with some of the rubbish dumped at Dursley Bus station.

Reproduced courtesy of Gazette - November 1997.