Plastic plates at Glastonbury

[stuartbert two hats]

At some point people themselves have to take responsibility- The Jazzworld/ Westholts field gets covered in plates and discarded food despite being surrounded by tonnes of bins. It's not up to the festival to come up with any more solutions- it's up to the punters to stop being so f***ing lazy and thoughtless that they can't be arsed to walk 3 to 4 meters to a bin.

[stardustjunkie]

How about getting your food served on plastic plates and charging a £1 deposit which when returned after your meal you get back?

[Mr.Tease]

So just leave it like it is then.Good one.

[Woffy]

Which would essentially stop you from exploring because you'd have to stand there and eat your food close to the stall before you can wander off anywhere else. I had a discussion with some other people earlier about how for the life of me I can't find this breakfast place I really liked. We searched everywhere for it after having had breakfast there the previous day. I'd be screwed if I'm going wandering and then have to find the damn place to return the plate again.

People just need to take responsibility for their actions and their surroundings. I firmly believe that there should be on the spot fines for any camping area that is an absolute tip, fines go to charity, but the fines can be avoided if they clean up their area there and then with a bin bag supplied by a steward. It would make people think twice about throwing a baby wipe or 100 on the ground.

Paper plates are recyclable and wont damage the environment if they're trodden in to the ground. I'm thinking about the extremes here but if a plastic plate gets cracked/broken and trodden in to the mud, there's potential for damage to livestock etc.

[grumpyhack]

I've been to other festivals where a 10p charge was levied by bars on a pint glass (bio-degradeable plastic not actual glass). If you returned your glass for washing you didn't have to pay the 10p for your next pint.

It worked quite well - particularly for kids. A lot of adults would buy a pint and then throw the empty glass in one of the bins. The kids were going round, picking all the glasses out and taking them to the bars to claim 10p a glass.

That might work but I can't see it for plates.

[Woffy]

Could the green police, uh, police litter dropping as well as people pissing in hedges / toilets?

If they don't already.

[Mr.Tease]

Could the green police, uh, police litter dropping as well as people pissing in hedges / toilets?

If they don't already.

[UEF]

Don't you think its time Glastonbury addressed this?

[LondonTom]

At some point people themselves have to take responsibility- The Jazzworld/ Westholts field gets covered in plates and discarded food despite being surrounded by tonnes of bins. It's not up to the festival to come up with any more solutions- it's up to the punters to stop being so f***ing lazy and thoughtless that they can't be arsed to walk 3 to 4 meters to a bin.

[Woffy]

The Green police were disbanded- they weren't at the festival last year.

[Thearg]

If you put a bin near where someone is sat, and they still can't be bothered putting their rubbish in it, then you can come up with all the grand schemes you like- it's not going to change anything because when you're dealing with that level of selfish laziness it's futile, because no scheme is going to require less effort than that.

You need to focus on getting people to take responsibility- spread a message, don't pander to that kind of behaviour. I remember in 2003 they kept pushing the 'don't p*** in the hedges' message and it worked. Well for a few years anyways- now a lot of festival goers just wee, poo and drop litter where they stand. It's an attitude issue, so thats why I guess I'd focus on challenging that.

[stardustjunkie]

There's bins EVERYWHERE!

[Woffy]

I'm not sure why you've replied that to me, I haven't claimed otherwise. I for one recycle and throw all my rubbish away.

[A Guy Called Matt]

I live in the Forest of Dean, a place of natural beauty - and yet people litter everywhere. Families walk miles into the forest with a picnic, eat the food and dump all the rubbish.

I have even seen plastic plates and mugs dumped after a picnic.

Whatever you do there are, sadly, loads of people to ignorant to bother using a bin.

There is only one language that these people understand and that is money - it will take a lot of stewards on the ground but an on the spot fine with threat of being thrown out is about the only way I am afraid.

Even a £1 deposit would make no difference to some - they would just trow the plastic plate away!

[Spindles]

That's the downside of pay-for schemes (talking broadly here, as in things like green levies in taxation or taxing unhealthy foods as much as anything). Those who can afford to transgress just do so and those who can't have to grin and bare it.

The cup deposit scheme worked well at Reading, with enterprising kids making a few quid. I collected cups on a Sunday to pay for dinner before.

[Mr.Tease]

Huh.

Any idea why?

I didn't notice, tbh. I treated last year as my stag do and thus did things 'a bit differently'.

[A Guy Called Matt]

That's the downside of pay-for schemes (talking broadly here, as in things like green levies in taxation or taxing unhealthy foods as much as anything). Those who can afford to transgress just do so and those who can't have to grin and bare it.

The cup deposit scheme worked well at Reading, with enterprising kids making a few quid. I collected cups on a Sunday to pay for dinner before.

[BA4 4BY]

Much as I agree with the sentiment behind the plate deposit idea I think it would be a non-starter on health and hygiene grounds alone.

I imagine the potential for bacterial infections would be quite significant from plates not being washed properly between uses (if at all?!), along with any number of other nasties they could pick up whilst being dragged around the site.

[ICGenie]

This isn't to excuse the idiots who do drop litter straight on the floor, but the bins have never been emptied frequently enough in all the time I've been. Admittedly, the last time I went was 2010 - have things changed much since then?

[stardustjunkie]

If the bins are full, I just put my rubbish by the correct bin. Not ideal but better than randomly dropping it on the floor.

[giantkatestacks]

They are emptied as much as they are able to. Once you get to a certain point in the day you cant physically get the lorries round to empty those bins again.

[Dog Burger]

I find all the rubbish strewn around Glastonbury and other festivals annoying,people seem to chuck there paper plates where they stand making it unpleasant to sit down on the grass avoiding half eaten curries etc.Don't you think its time Glastonbury addressed this?They could sell plastic ones at the gates with they're logo on with the proceeds going to Water aid and make the stalls charge the same price, say 3 quid for a paper one,it wouldn't be too much of a hardship,a bin to scrape your food in and a rinse underneath the tap or a once over with a wet wipe,most people carry round a bag for beers etc so it would't be a problem.The impact on the site would be significant,less bins,less litter pickers etc.I'm sure they must of thought of this but to me its a no brainer.

Any thoughts?

[glasto-worker]

The cup deposit scheme worked well at Reading, with enterprising kids making a few quid. I collected cups on a Sunday to pay for dinner before.

[frostypaw]

Nice thought but would never work - people are too goddamn lazy to walk a few metres to a bin, asking them to walk many many metres to a washing point then carry stuff around just isn't going to work.

I think it doesn't help that people keep banging on about the bins being overflowing - bollocks. They always end up overflowing by the end of Sunday but for most of the week they're regularly emptied and only occasionally overful - spreading such rumours means people who read it will latch onto it as an excuse and not even try

We already live in a society convinced there's going to be some plebs along to clean up after us so we don't have to touch dirty things - and we've brought more and more of that segment of mainstream society into the festival - and financially based 'motivation' to change them will only unnecessarily punish those who are already behaving decently

It needs spelling out more clearly in the guide, in money terms - tell people how much of their ticket price is going on the clean-up right on the 2nd/3rd page or mid-lineup so they can't miss it. Include a photo of West Holts at 7am pre-cleanup. Spell out that by leaving stuff you are being a horrifically selfish person not thinking of who has to clean it up, or who might slip or stand or sit in the mess you've made assuming some immigrant servant will come sort everything out for you

Generally fuck this whole gently-gently thing on the tory-thinking scum, spell it out as if to a child. It won't upset those of us with brains and consciences as we know it already and the rest are little better than flytippers.

[gibbin82]

Nice idea, but there are a few fatal flaws in it why it would never work. Firstly it appears that a lot of people don't care about what they throw away, you only have to look around the site at the end of the festival to see thousands of pounds worth of camping gear and crates of beer. Many people who did want to keep there plastic plate for reuse would just scrape off their left over food where they stood and then wipe their plate with a wet wipe or tissue which they would also just chuck on the ground. And finally and most importantly paper plates quickly bio-degrade, unlike plastic plates which if broken in to small shards by being trampled into the ground and then left after the festival can cause fatal internal injuries to any unfortunate cow that happened to eat them.