Lesley gets first Island CPRE Award

Congratulations to Lesley

from the Ventnorian

for getting the first award on the Island from the
Campaign to Protect Rural England as part of their
Anti Litter Campaign.

Lesley being presented the award by the IW CPRE President Dr Paul Hooper, and at the back John Power, the Vice-Chairman and Awards Officer.




The award was presented to Lesley at the Campaign to Protect Rural England Isle of Wight Branch Annual General Meeting at Ventnor Botanic Garden on Saturday 17 May 2008.

When Bill Bryson took over the Presidency of CPRE in July 2007, he announced that his No 1 priority would be to launch a new crusade against fly-tippers and litterbugs, to boost the excellent work already done by the Keep Britain Tidy campaign which has already existed for more than 50 years, but which he thought needed to be relaunched as Get Britain Tidy.


In the CPRE report on litter and fly tipping it states: In the UK, an estimated 25 million tonnes of litter a year are dropped (almost entirely food and drink packaging) – five times more than in the 1960s. The report has a lot of depressing statistics about litter and fly tipping but the CPRE are going to be very active in raising awareness and addressing the problem on the Island. This was at the end of the report:

A heart-warming example.

Lesley Genge is the proprietress of an eco-friendly shop at the junction of High Street and Spring Hill, Ventnor, called The Ventnorian. It’s been described by a former town mayor as a “green tardis”. Lesley believes that it is not enough to write letters and hope that someone else will take responsibility, but that if we are going to curb environmental pollution then we need to start with ourselves and the way we live our day to day lives, and to try actively to encourage change. So she is one of the founders of Ventbag, a voluntary group with an ongoing commitment to a tidy community, which hopes to make Ventnor Plastic Carrier Bag Free, an initiative which has already received encouraging support from residents, shopkeepers and the town council. Ventbag also provides instructions for making cloth shopping bags for free distribution to the community. She also leads the Ventbag litter reduction initiative with a small team of committed volunteers, and she has been photographed, and appears on the VentnorBlog, with her litter-picking tool cleaning up the Spring Hill Gardens green public leisure space on a daily basis. She wants to form a group of children to join her team as a fun activity with an educational objective.

We are going to give Lesley a CPRE certificate to hang up in her shop to recognise her ongoing commitment to litter removal and for promotion of the Ventbag campaign for plastic litter reduction. We are also going to give her a cheque for £100 for use by Ventbag to expand its resources, for instance to purchase gloves and litter-picking rods for her children’s team.

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Mark Compton-Hall put her up for the award as he like the rest of us was impressed with her efforts in making at least part of Ventnor litter free for the benefit of residents and visitors. Mark said

I was so proud to see her walk up and collect her award today. She was watched by some very senior people and politicians on the island including our town mayor (Susan Scoccia) and our island MP Andrew Turner“.

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Lesley has been doing a wonderful job keeping the area at the bottom of Spring Hill, Central Car Park and the little park opposite the Ventnorian clear of litter for months. It is brilliant to see her getting recognition for her hard work, which is a never ending job, picking up litter that people cannot be bothered to put in the bins.
Lesley’s Anti Litter efforts have been featured before on Ventnor Blog.

I think we all ought to thank her by going and buying lots of things from her shop The Ventnorian, Spring Hill.

If you are not familiar with the shop which stocks beautiful wooden toys; some health foods; jewellery; locally made crafts; lots of organic, non-toxic toiletries and household goods. She sells the Ecover washing up liquid, fabric condition and washing liquid and you can take your empty bottles back to be refilled saving yourself money and landfill from yet another bottle. There are too many items to list, it is well worth a visit.

Lesley and Mark will be on the Ventbag/Ventnorian stall next weekend at the Big Green Picnic, stop by and say hello.

Please note that the Big Green Picnic will not be held at Church Litten it will now be in the car park next to County Hall.

Southern Vectis will be offering discounted travel to and from the event. It will only cost £2 for a return journey from anywhere on the Island.

To get your coupon for discounted travel, please either download it from the Big Green Picnic site or cut out the coupon in the Big Green Picnic County Press supplement on 23rd May.