Villagers run, skate and cycle 170 miles to save Cornwall pub
Chair Sam Fitch said if they achieved their plans they would need "everyone behind us"."Some people will be able to put in a little, some will be able to put in a lot."But just like the 100-mile challenge, we hope we'll be able to reach our target and purchase the pub."The fundraiser also included pig racing, live music and a line dancing workshop.
The group also applied for grant funding - offering people the chance to buy shares.Allison Mcgee-Harrison from the group said: "By buying it [the pub] as a community and sharing it with the community enables us to have different projects for young people and right the way through to knitting circles and things like that, so it is really important."
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Telegraph
9 minutes ago
- Telegraph
The 180-ton ‘wet wipe island' that's clogging up the Thames
To a casual observer, the pair of mechanical excavators raking through the mulch on the Thames's southern foreshore might well signify little. It's a quiet spot at the foot of London's Hammersmith Bridge, overlooked by a towpath and a few passing swans. But something major is happening here: the first-of-its-kind mechanised removal of what has been locally dubbed ' wet wipe island '. Surveys suggest this stomach-churning build-up of detritus has changed the very course of the river. Yet, until now, the work of tackling it has largely been left to volunteers for Thames21, an environmental charity. In Wellington boots and protective gloves, they have stalked the exposed shore at low tide, picking out wet wipes that Londoners have flushed down toilets – and which have, over the years, amalgamated into something far more gruesome than the sum of their parts. The numbers alone are grim: in the past eight years, volunteers have collected more than 140,000 wet wipes spewed into the river when storm overflows discharge sewage during periods of heavy rainfall. Thames Water clears 3.8 billion wipes from its network every year, at an annual cost of £18m. The 'island' of these that has formed near Hammersmith Bridge, where the river bends and the water moves slowly, is roughly the size of two tennis courts. According to modelling by the Port of London Authority (PLA), which has now taken the lead on the expensive clean-up operation, it weighs 180 tons, or the same as 15 double-decker buses. It's mostly composed of wet wipes clumped up with twigs, and has grown as high as a metre in some places. '[An] embarrassment to the capital,' the PLA has said. Were it to appear in a Don DeLillo novel, this outsized agglomeration would offer a discomfiting metaphor for how we live: as rapacious consumers who bury our waste beneath our city, creating an underworld we'd rather not consider. And for some years, indeed, the dogged, strong-stomached volunteers have shouldered the burden of doing so. 'When [they] are there, they [realise] it's worse than they expected,' says Liz Gyekye from Thames21, which has monitored this side of the bridge since 2017. 'You do hear people saying, 'I didn't know how bad the problem is…' Once you get onto the foreshore, [you can see the wet wipes] are everywhere.' It is feared they can harm wildlife and ecology locally, as well as further afield. The problem, she says, is that the wipes contain plastic, which breaks down into microplastics. These can then make their way into the stomachs of animals, according to studies. 'It will flow into oceans eventually and fish will be eating it and we eat the fish,' says Gyekye. Despite this unappetising prospect, we continue to flush the wipes down our toilets when they should be disposed of in the bin. Even better, Gyekye adds, is not buying them at all. 'We've always put out the message, 'bin it, don't flush it',' she says. '[And] we urge people to use alternatives. They're convenient but the best thing is not to use them.' Although wet wipes were invented in the middle of the 20th century, their widespread use – and hence the problem of their disposal – is a relatively recent phenomenon. 'In the 1970s and 1980s, people used cotton wool and water to wipe their babies' bottoms,' says Gyekye. 'It's only from the 1990s they started marketing this innovation. People aren't just using them for babies but to remove make-up.' Some 11 billion are used every year in the UK, with about 90 per cent containing plastic. In London, so-called 'nappy valley' areas like Battersea are responsible for particularly high usage, Gyekye suggests. This summer, inspired by the charity's action, the PLA is trying a different method to clear away the wet wipe island, deploying specially commissioned excavators to rake the foreshore, gather up the wipes and remove them, after which they will be taken to a skip and disposed of. The work, mostly funded by the PLA and started this week, will take a month and is thought to be costing hundreds of thousands of pounds. The excavators are being stored on the grounds of the adjacent independent St Paul's School while not in use. 'Frankly it is disgusting,' says Mark Anderson, the PLA's head of corporate affairs, of the wet wipe island. 'We are just as frustrated as anybody, and have wanted to see this addressed for years.' The completion of a new ' super sewer ' (the Thames Tideway Tunnel), the interest and financial commitment 'have now aligned to get this going', he adds. If it's emblematic of our throwaway culture, and the mountains of waste we generate, it is also arguably a sign of how poorly we care for our waterways. Last year, a report from The Rivers Trust found that no single stretch of river in England or Northern Ireland was in good overall health, and that toxic chemicals that remain in ecosystems for decades pollute every stretch of English rivers. Untreated sewage spills were found to blight most of our rivers. In the capital, the sewerage system was historically designed to discharge into the rivers, to prevent sewage from backing up into people's homes. Before Joseph Bazalgette created the network for Victorian London, raw sewage flowed into the Thames, from where London drew its drinking water supply. 'A portion of the inhabitants of the metropolis are made to consume, in some form or another, a portion of their own excrement, and moreover, to pay for the privilege,' observed microbiologist Arthur Hassall in 1850. Cholera epidemics served to illustrate the toll this took on people's health, although at the time the disease was believed to be airborne, carried by the stench of the river. Bazalgette engineered his way out of this, but his system was not designed to cope with a population the size of the capital's current one. After huge growth in the 19th century, there were 6.5 million people in London by the start of the 20th century. Today that figure is closer to nine million, and the city once again seems overwhelmed by its own waste. In 2023, at least 14.2 billion litres of sewage ended up in the Thames, according to figures obtained by the Liberal Democrats. Work is under way to reduce this. In February this year the Thames Tideway Tunnel became fully connected. It is expected to reduce sewage discharges into the tidal Thames by 95 per cent, including at the location where the island has formed. Thames Water, which has been criticised for its handling of the general problem, has promised £9.5bn (in 2022-23 prices) of investment over the next five years to safeguard the environment and improve river health. The water company and the Environment Agency are working with the PLA to tackle wet wipe island. 'We continue to work with partners to create a better River Thames for people and wildlife,' says Charlie Wood, the London director of the Environment Agency. The Government also plans to ban wet wipes containing plastic, something Thames21 has campaigned for. 'This is part of our wider plan to rebuild the water system, which includes a record £104bn investment to halve sewage spills by 2030 and a new, powerful regulator responsible for the entire water sector – created by abolishing Ofwat and merging four water regulators into one,' says a spokesman for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Back near Hammersmith Bridge, a couple of passers-by look on as the excavators continue to rake away at the wet wipe problem. London continues to go about its business, consuming and then discarding material things in frightening numbers. But DeLillo's Underworld, in which waste is a central theme, carries a haunting warning. As one character tells Nick Shay, the novel's protagonist: 'What we excrete comes back to consume us.'
Telegraph
39 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Gen Z students taught to make phone calls in preparation for university clearing
Schools are teaching Gen Z how to make phone calls because they are anxious about speaking to university admissions teams. Ucas, the higher education admissions service, said schools are now holding workshops on basic phone skills so they can navigate clearing ahead of this year's A level results day. The organisation hopes to eventually digitise the process of obtaining a university place through clearing but pupils currently have to ring admissions teams and negotiate if they miss their offer. Research suggests Gen Z prefers to text or send a voice note than have a conversation via phone, and a survey last year found nearly a quarter of 18 to 34-year-olds never pick up calls. Dr Jo Saxton, the chief executive of Ucas, told The Times that some pupils needed to be told how to say hello and reminded that they needed their Ucas identifying number. She also said pupils had to be taught about the concept of being put on hold. She added: 'Because they don't usually make phone calls, they're not used to the same sort of etiquette and protocols of greeting and signing off, and making sure they've got the right research and information in front of them. 'Quite often students who ring Ucas have to phone us back because they didn't realise they needed their identifying number. It's helping them get their ducks in a row.' Clearing is expected to be more competitive than usual this year after universities made a record number of offers amid a worsening financial crisis across higher education. The scheme is available to students who do not meet the conditions of their offer on A-level results day, and matches applicants to university places that are yet to be filled. Clearing hotlines at most universities will open from 7am on results day on Thursday for disappointed pupils hoping to find a place on a degree. Ucas plans to modernise the clearing process and instead give pupils automatic offers that they can either accept or decline, but any new system will take several years to draw up. She told a separate webinar on Tuesday that clearing is no longer perceived as a 'bargain basement' for those who are not successful on A-level results day, since higher ranking universities are now using the scheme. Analysis found 17 of the 24 elite Russell Group universities had more than 3,600 courses with vacancies available through clearing this week. Universities are scrambling to fill seats with domestic students this year as they face financial pressures following a dramatic drop in foreign students. It will benefit students who open their A-levels on Thursday to learn they missed one or two grades, as they are expected to have a better chance of finding a place at a top university than in previous years. Speaking at an event hosted by the Higher Education Policy Institute on Tuesday, Dr Saxton said: 'Clearing maybe was perceived as a bargain basement – it was for the people who had been unsuccessful. But that is definitely not how current applicants perceive it. 'It is about students trusting their instincts and going back to their curated playlists, the favourites that they researched, that they've probably visited. They're not blindfolded throwing a dart at a dartboard.' It comes amid a broader debate over the value of going to university, with tuition fees set to rise for the first time in eight years from next month to £9,535 per year in England and Wales. Writing for The Telegraph, Dr Saxton and Vivienne Stern, the chief executive of Universities UK, said it was 'important not to let scepticism obscure the bigger picture about what the UK's world-leading higher education continues to offer'.
BBC News
2 hours ago
- BBC News
Future unclear for Coventry splash park shut by mechanical fault
A sign on the railings at a popular water play area has claimed it will be permanently closed but its future in fact remains and Play in Coventry's War Memorial Park closed more than a year ago due to a fault in the pump City Council previously said the feature, which was installed in 2004, would reopen in time for the school summer the wording of the sign, the authority said the attraction was only closed for the "foreseeable" and it was exploring options for it future, reiterating no decision had yet been taken. A spokesperson added: "In the meantime, there is still lots of fun for families to enjoy at our wonderful park."A woman at the park, who has two children axed six and nine, told BBC CWR the feature hadn't been open properly in the past so its closure hadn't made "much difference"."They were opening it the odd half an hour here and there... and it was never really publicised when it would be open and when it wouldn't be," she woman added: "It's just a shame for the children really isn't it, especially on a nice warm day like today." Follow BBC Coventry & Warwickshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
