Open Letters

Open letters to Members of Parliament

Volunteers across Cornwall are working tirelessly to protect our beaches, lanes, towns and green spaces. Through this work, they are seeing first hand that litter and plastic pollution is increasing, not decreasing. Community action is vital, but it cannot solve this problem alone.

To help ensure these voices are heard at a national level, Clean Cornwall has prepared an open letter to Members of Parliament. This is rooted in lived experience, data gathered on the ground, and a shared commitment to protecting Cornwall’s environment.

Letter from Clean Cornwall

This open letter is from us at Clean Cornwall speaking on behalf of the thousands of volunteers we support across the county. It brings together volunteer insight, county wide data and the wider environmental network to set out why stronger national action on litter and plastic pollution is urgently needed.

This letter is shared here for transparency and context, and will be formally sent by Clean Cornwall to local MPs as part of our ongoing policy and advocacy work.

Read letter here

Letter from volunteers

This second letter is written for you as Clean Cornwall volunteers or individuals wanting t to make a difference in our county. It is available for anyone to download and use, whether you are part of a litter picking group, a community organisation, or acting independently.

Volunteers are encouraged to personalise this letter if they wish and send it directly to their own MP, alongside a short covering email. Collective action, repeated across communities, helps reinforce that this is not an isolated concern but a shared and growing challenge.

Read letter here

Why this matters

Litter picking makes a visible difference, but prevention requires leadership beyond the community level. By sharing these letters, we aim to support volunteers to speak with confidence, amplify local voices, and call for the systemic change needed to reduce waste at source.

Every letter sent helps build momentum. Every voice adds weight.