Re your article about the local volunteers who try to keep our streets clean when Amey, who are paid to do it can’t manage (Rubbish threatens volunteers’ goodwill, December 1).

I suppose that if we had enough volunteers, then Amey wouldn’t have to bother.

Strangely, just after I read your article, I encountered a lady in our road with a plastic bag and ‘tongs' actually picking up rubbish.

She said that she was a local volunteer and had her ‘patch’ - what a lovely person!

It reminded me of a survey that I did a couple of years back on just what was the source of most of the rubbish and fouling on local streets.

Now that dog owners have been made responsible for cleaning up after their pets and most actually do so, and the charge for plastic bags has helped somewhat to reduce that problem; there is no doubt that numerically, the greatest source of rubbish is from smokers - and why?

Because they seem to believe that someone else will clear up their butts and packets.

Next, and perhaps more obvious, is almost certainly fast-food litter and produce (bottles, packets, boxes, wrappings and half eaten food), then come sweet and cake wrappers.

Like dog muck, Saturday night 'puking on the pavement' seems to have reduced in recent months, but not disappeared entirely, so watch where you tread on Sunday morning if there hasn’t been rain overnight!

I recall an old Irish saying - 'You can get the man out of the bog, but it’s virtually impossible to get the bog out of the man’. But we must keep trying.

Thanks go to all the volunteers who try to keep our fine town clean for the benefit of our public - it is noticed by many of us.

Brian Clancy
Altrincham