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Fife Street Champions members took part in a clean up of Kirkcaldy’s East Burn and Pannie Den on Sunday. The group managed to remove 37 bags of litter, and a range of other items such as dumped kitchen unit doors, a broken TV unit and a child’s bike.

The group has spent a number of years working to clean up the region, but with the weekend action its latest initiative. David Spence, group spokesman, said that often the work groups like Fife Street Champions do can be overlooked.

He said: “It was one hell of a mess, but someone walking through it now for the first time would never know we were there. So often what we do is often overlooked because of that. I always say you can never tell when a litter picker has been, only when they haven’t been.”

David dubbed the work “never-ending” and said that the issues are common across the rest of the United Kingdom.

He explained: “You can go onto a page called UK Litter Picking groups on Facebook. There are groups like ours all over the country and not a council anywhere can cope. Somebody made a comment on the page saying ‘is that not the council’s job?’ – it is, but there’s not a council that can handle it all.”

David works with the Fife Coastal and Countryside Trust cleaning beaches and said that just a week after cleaning a beach, it can once again be covered in litter. “A big tide can bring it all in again,” he explained.

The group, which can be found on Facebook under Fife Street Champions - litter picking and supporting community action, has around 3000 members but with a number of events planned for the rest of the year, David is always keen to encourage new members along.

He said: “When someone posts an event, they can say that they are coming or that they are interested. We’ve also got spare pickers which we can lend out.”