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Brussels to ask tobacco association to pay for clean-up of cigarette ends

18:34 05/10/2018

The Brussels regional government plans to request €200,000 from the local tobacco industry to help clean-up the capital’s streets. The money is meant to compensate the city for costs of cleaning up cigarette ends.

Last month, neighbourhood groups organised clean-ups, filling bins with spent cigarettes and putting them on show to illustrate the enormity of the problem. While Friends of the Ponds in Ixelles managed to find 25,000 cigarette butts in the 40 kilograms of litter it collected, Leo Not Happy cleared 240,000 cigarette ends in three hours out of the Saint-Catherine area.

Someone else who’s not happy is Brussels state secretary Fadila Laanan, who plans to submit a formal request to sector federation Cimabel for reimbursement of fees paid to street cleaners. “Our intention is to have tobacco manufacturers contribute to the actions taken in the Brussels region,” she told La Libre.

Faced with similar complaints in Flanders, the federation helped pay for the placing of special cigarette receptacles built directly into the sidewalks in front of public buildings. Brussels is hoping for a similar commitment.

Photo courtesy Leo Not Happy/Twitter

Written by Lisa Bradshaw

Comments

Anonymous

Smokers filthy habits have created these problems, so they should be made responsible for their filthy actions; obligate them to use a metal tin to dispose of their cigarette butts; once full empty the metal tin into a rubbish bin. In Singapore first time offenders who throw small items like cigarette butts or candy wrappers are fined $300. Enforce it here; if the person(s) cannot afford it then they should be obligated to carry out community service.

Oct 7, 2018 12:47
Anon3

They should also clean up in the Forêt de Soignes. Cigarette butts and all other sorts of rubbish (plastic wrappings/containers, glass bottles, papers, diapers, bags of household waste, etc. etc.) are routinely dropped/left behind by Brussels nature lovers running, strolling or walking their dogs.

Oct 8, 2018 10:17