McDonald's cartons, littering and 'appalling' dog fouling along Wayfarer's Walk in Hampshire

Littering and dog fouling along Wayfarer’s Walk near White Hill is “the worst I’ve ever seen it”, according to former borough council leader Ken Rhatigan.

Mr Rhatigan, who represents the Tadley North, Kingsclere and Baughurst ward, said there was more dog mess than he’d ever seen on a walk there recently, and that he’d even picked up discarded McDonald’s packaging “so no one else had Ronald McDonald as part of their walk”.

Signs up there designating public footpaths have also been torn down and thrown away.

Speaking in a Kingsclere Parish Council meeting, he said: “The fact is, it’s disgusting.

“I’m passionate about it because it’s the most beautiful part of Hampshire.

“You have a view over hundreds of miles, and yet it’s spoiled by people who are only thinking about themselves and don’t care about the community that uses it as part of their leisure.”

There are two public bins in the layby next to Wayfarer’s Walk.

The stretch of land is owned by the Earl of Huntingdon, William Hastings-Bass, who called for a greater focus in education on littering and its consequences.

He said: “It’s about the importance of the environment.

“The kids should be telling their parents to pick up dog poo and not to throw stuff out the window.

“It’s just as easy to have a bag in the car, stick it in there, and then stick in the black bin when you get home.

“The people who hang them off trees are better off not picking it up than putting them in plastic bags.

“It’s just ugly and somebody else has to go along and pick it up."

Mr Hastings-Bass said he had no idea why people broke off signs, wondering whether “it’s this ‘right to roam’ carried to the nth degree”.

He continued: “A right to roam would be absolutely fine if they didn’t trash the places they do roam.

“I don’t mind anyone walking over the farmland, as long as they leave it neat and tidy.”