Sir, - I agree with your correspondent Tom Kavanagh, Chairman of Irish Business Against Litter (January 28th). However, the biggest single gesture he could make towards counteracting the litter problem would be to have a quiet word with the supermarket bosses, many of whom are probably members of his organisation, and ask them to stop packing groceries in plastic bags.
Every time I make a trip to the supermarket for a modest amount of groceries, I find myself leaving the premises with up to a dozen of these plastic bags. Some of them may contain only two items. The bags, which seem to be completely indestructible, form the largest single component of the litter on our streets, public parks, railway lines, hedges and car-parks. Even the branches of the tallest trees are festooned with them.
In the US, groceries are packed in brown paper bags. If we did the same here, it probably wouldn't stop people littering but at least the paper bags would disintegrate with a heavy shower of rain, instead of remaining as a permament memento of public carelessness. - Yours, etc., Paul Milne,
The Village, Bettyglen, Dublin 5.