The Government has been challenged to step up enforcement against illegal dumping in the State's forests and beauty spots, by the industry and environmental group Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL).
The group which yesterday named Dundalk as the cleanest town in the Republic - and Sligo as the dirtiest - also said a "clean-up" deal between Government and chewing gum manufacturers was a failure.
Speaking at the launch of IBAL's "litter league" for 2007, its chairman Dr Tom Cavanagh said Government had missed a chance to place a 20 cent tax on packs of chewing gum when a deal was negotiated by former minister for the environment Dick Roche.
Under the terms of this deal the gum industry agreed to contribute about €6 million over three years to the cost of cleaning gum from streets, but Dr Cavanagh said the measure was wholly inadequate. He cited main streets of towns and villages - particularly areas such as Eyre Square in Galway, on which local authorities had spent millions of euro - which were disfigured by chewing gum.
Dr Cavanagh said IBAL was planning a campaign later this year to secure a declaration from current Minister for the Environment John Gormley that he intends to introduce a tax on the sale of chewing gum.
Congratulating Dundalk for winning the cleanest town category in the 2007 Litter League, Dr Cavanagh said he had no doubt that efforts by the town council to remove chewing gum from the streets had made a big difference to the appearance of the town, and impressed the judges. Calling for more enforcement of legislation to prevent illegal dumping Dr Cavanagh said even Coillte the State forestry company had complained about the incidence of dumping in forests and at picnic places and sites of otherwise unspoilt natural beauty.
This was doubly unfortunate as it was these sites which attracted tourists and they saw some of the State's worst litter blackspots.
Minister of State Tony Killeen said much progress had been made. He noted the fact that 22 towns in the 50-town litter league now qualified as "litter free" and that the number was increasing annually. Referring to dumping at beauty spots Mr Killeen said it was "an extraordinary indictment of the people that they are prepared to do that". But he said that in the absence of 24-hour monitoring and the use of video cameras prosecution was a difficulty for local authorities.
