KFC backs Great British Spring Clean as Daily Mail-backed campaign nears 1 million target - ReadSector

Fast food giant KFC has vowed to fight the litter scourge as it acknowledged it has an important role in stopping takeaway rubbish.

The chicken chain has been criticised over KFC-branded waste, something its boss has said is ‘distressing’.

But now it has promised it will make amends, starting with backing the Great British Spring Clean – as staff from all of its 600 UK restaurants were sent out yesterday to clean up their areas.

Paula MacKenzie, managing director of the firm in Britain and Ireland, said: ‘I can say this as the MD of KFC, there is nothing more distressing than when you’re walking or driving somewhere and you see a piece of your own brand that you care very, very much about – sometimes nowhere near a KFC restaurant – and you’re like, “how did that get there?”.

‘Litter has always been a topic of utmost importance. If you run a takeaway restaurant brand then litter is up there as one of the top challenges you want to tackle.’

Fast food giant KFC has vowed to fight the litter scourge, starting with backing the Great British Spring Clean campaign

PS: The Crown star Emma Corrin takes park louts to task

Actress Emma Corrin has told revellers on London’s Hampstead Heath it’s ‘not cool’ to litter.

The Crown star said she had spent Monday evening picking up after them.

The Mail has long campaigned against the plight of plastic pollution.

When the UK came out of lockdown in May last year, distressing images showed fast food litter strewn across the country’s parks and beaches.

One picture of a discarded box featuring the face of Colonel Sanders, the KFC figurehead, in Beccles, Suffolk, went viral, drawing more than 40,000 reactions and 6,000 comments online after being posted by nature photographer Harry Read.

The fast food giant reacted with posters urging its customers not to be ‘tossers’.

As the country comes out of lockdown again, KFC said it will introduce a dedicated email address – [email protected] – for customers to log complaints about litter around restaurants.

It will also train 28,000 employees on the damage litter can cause and will work with councils across England to determine what infrastructure they have to deal with rubbish problems.

This is in addition to the three rubbish clean-ups KFC staff do around restaurants each day.

Conservative MP Rebecca Pow tidies up rubbish as part of the Great British Spring Clean in her Taunton constituency

The branches taking part yesterday included those in Penrith, Cumbria; Buckshaw Village, Lancashire; Newton Aycliffe, County Durham; Beckton, east London; Handsworth, Sheffield and in Taunton, where environment minister Rebecca Pow helped out.

Mrs MacKenzie said: ‘We all have a responsibility and the bigger a company you are, the more responsibility to have.

‘We have a big responsibility as KFC but I think we all have a responsibility as members of the public to make our country and our place where we live look the best it can be, I feel passionate about that.’

She added she and her sons, aged eight and ten, would be litter picking the next time they were on holiday.

Mrs MacKenzie said that while some councils struggled with red tape, private business had an important role to play in dealing with litter.

154,658 litter pickers have so far pledged to clean 981,119 miles of Britain’s streets, beaches and countryside [Stock image]

The news follows years of campaigning by the Daily Mail against plastic pollution

She said: ‘I remember talking to council members who said, “It’s almost impossible for us as a council to sign off even a bin – to get the money, to get the budget – to sign off a bin.” So we just have such a role to play.’

Yesterday 154,658 volunteers had pledged to clean 981,119 miles of the UK, putting the Great British Spring Clean – organised by Keep Britain Tidy and backed by the Daily Mail – in touching distance of its target of a million miles by June 13.

For more info go to gbspringclean.org