Link:
England Gets Cleaner But London Remains Filthy.
LONDON (Reuters) - While parks and leafy lanes are getting cleaner, a survey published on Wednesday showed that London still holds the ignoble title as the dirtiest place to live in England.
London managed to score only 43 points out of 100 for cleanliness, compared to the east of England, the most pristine place to live with a scored of 72.
The survey found overall standards had risen 4 per cent, with 44 per cent of areas deemed "good" or "satisfactory" and only 4 per cent rated "poor."
"For the first time in years, a national survey has shown improvements in the state of England," Alan Woods, chief executive of "Keep Britain Tidy" said in a statement.
I'm not surprised to read London is getting filthier, but the rest of England getting cleaner? They must be living on a different island (perhaps Rockall Island, population 0).
The island I live on--approximately the size of Pennsylvania, population 60 million--is a litterbug's lair. There's an appalling amount of trash strewn about the highways, streets, and sidewalks of once-fair Brittania. On a two-mile stretch of the A40, enough litter has accumulated to fill a good-sized lorry or two. Plastic bags wave jauntily from the trees, orange peels wait for decomposition along the sidewalks, crisps wrappers remind me constantly I'm not in Kansas anymore. (I never was, actually, but I bet it's cleaner than Bucks County.)
And even worse than litter, which can at least be overlooked, is graffiti, which shouts to be noticed. On the way to Oxford I saw scrawled on an embankment "Thank God For Jesus Christ," to which someone had added "Amen!" Defacing public property, no matter the degree of one's religious fervor, is just tacky. (In the old days of Oxford, such messy fanaticism would have been rewarded with a burning at stake.)
I think the problem is there's no sad-eyed Native American icon to prod the national conscience. Perhaps William the Conqueror could be enlisted to come back, wave his sword around a bit, and shame the Tesco-shopping descendants of the once-proud Angles and Saxons into cleaning up their act.
If not, I'd consider bringing back the stocks.
