Volunteers from across the county have united to rid Coalville of a staggering amount of litter.

North Leicestershire Litter Wombles, South Leicestershire Litter Wombles and hundreds of feeder groups from local towns and villages have collected a total of 576 bags of rubbish that had been strewn across the town so far this calendar year.

The North Leicestershire strand of the group was only formed nine months ago by Sam Laywood but already has over 1200 members.

The 35-year-old, who lives in Belton, was alerted to the problem of litter when he became a dog owner just over a year ago.

On regular walks with his dog, he began to notice that litter was a big problem.

"Once you've seen it once, you have your litter goggles on, and just notice it everywhere," he said.

Determined to make a difference, Sam purchased his own litter picker and began to clean up his local village. After sharing pictures of his cleaning exploits on social media he was contacted by Bob Lee, the founder of the South Leicestershire Litter Wombles.

"After a few months, he came and did a litter pick with me. He told me all about it, how they record all the bags and how many people are out there doing it, and the benefits of protecting the environment, the wildlife. It basically just opened me up to a whole new area, I didn't know how broad and big this could go," said Sam.

"I'd been doing it for a few months in Belton, and Belton's not the biggest village in the world and I ran out of areas to do."

After some gentle persuasion from Mr Lee, Sam founded The North Leicestershire Litter Wombles in June, 2020.

He told Coalville Nub News there were an enormous amount of benefits to litter picking.

He said: "The physical exercise side of it, it keeps you fit, it's absolutely draining, doing the work we do.

"The mental health side of it, getting out, fresh air. In lockdown, people have been bored and stuck at home for months on end. It's giving people a life and a purpose in life - there's a lot of retired people that have started doing it.

"It's almost life saving, so to speak. The main thing is we're cleaning our environment and we are protecting our wildlife.

"We log every single bag and location that we collect. During the pandemic it has just exploded. People have been furloughed, people have had more time, people want a hobby, it's good for mental health, it's exercise."

Local business owners have also helped out with the effort. Lisa Parker, owner of Coalville based printing company Inkling, has personalised high visibility jackets and clothing for litter pickers with their names and the North Leicestershire Litter Wombles logo on it.

Meanwhile, Mark Jarvis, who owns Coalville Cleaning Company has donated equipment such as litter pickers, hoops and bags.

"Everyone's coming together as a community," added Sam.

When the rubbish has been collected litter pickers are encouraged to tie the bags up securely, leave them in a non-hazardous location before taking a picture of them and using one of a range of free applications for mobile phones such as 'Love Clean Streets.'

"It pins the location and sends an automated email directly to the council. It takes 30 seconds, it's flawless. As long as we leave it safely, our job as Wombles is done," said Sam.

Some of the Wombles also separate the cans from the rest of their rubbish as part of an initiative run by the charity Helipads for Hospitals who are aiming to collect five million of them.

Founded by John Nowell, Helipads for Hospitals is hoping to collect enough aluminium to be smelted down in order to create a helipad for the air ambulance to land on.

Currently, when transporting patients to The Leicester Royal Infirmary, the air ambulance is forced to land on Nelson Mandela Park.

The patients are then transferred to road ambulances before being driven to the hospital for the remaining three quarters of a mile. This adds precious minutes on to each patient's journey.

Sam said: "So obviously, in a way that will save lives because that four or five minute journey that could be the timeframe, someone could die on that journey."

"We've collected just over a million cans which is a good start, there's another four million to go and again this is all voluntary. People are driving round and picking up the cans and all sorts."

There have been a number of specialist red collection bins installed in towns across Leicestershire. However, Coalville currently doesn't have one. Local resident, Lauren Springthorpe, has taken it upon herself to store cans collected in Coalville until they are picked up by the charity.

"All the litter pickers in Coalville, and probably sometimes further afield will drop all their cans off to Laura. And then Laura crates them all up into big one tonne builders bags and then John collects them. It pulls everyone together. "

Without Laura's offer to store the cans, litter pickers from Coalville would be forced to drive ten minutes to Belton to dispose of their cans there. This is impossible for some, who don't have access to a vehicle and would perhaps discourage others from helping out with the scheme.

If you would like to join either of the Leicestershire Womble groups, both links are below. There are also a number of localised feeder groups, so if you'd rather join one of them, just ask the admin team of either of the Womble groups and they will redirect you to your local Litter picking hub:

North Leicestershire Litter Wombles | Facebook

South Leicestershire Litter Wombles | Facebook

For more information on Helipads for Hospitals, please see here: Helipads for Hospitals – Together, we can help Air Ambulance patients.