The summer holidays are fast approaching – we know, they spent enough time at home last year, but at least over the holidays, you don’t have to homeschool.

With fun on the brain, and panicking parents wondering how on earth they’ll keep the kids entertained for six weeks, we’ve listed a range of activities to help inspire your children to learn more about our environment. 

Our children will inherit this earth, as guardians of a greener future, it’s our duty to give them the knowledge and tools to make the most sustainable decisions. 

Bookmark our blog, share it with your partner or friends, and take note of these activities which will make your small ones see adventure the every day. 

Get Growing 

Many of us have the luxury of a garden at home, but few attempt to grow our own fruits and vegetables. 

The more we can eat homegrown food, the better, as we don’t have to travel for produce, or buy produce from other countries, which also impacts our carbon footprint. 

According to the latest data from the United Nations, food production is responsible for one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. 

Grab some seeds from your local gardening shop and get the children in on the action of creating new plant beds and planting the seeds. 

They will love tending to the plants and enjoying the fruits of their labour once everything has grown. Who knows, it may even encourage them to finally eat their greens! 

Transform Recycling into Crafts 

Art Attack was how we all learned to transform Fairy Liquid bottles into rockets, and Weetabix boxes into castles. It was inspirational for a generation, but that same creative flair can still be harnessed now. 

Using recycled items for crafts is a wonderful way to give your kids some creative time, and help them to understand more about the materials that cannot be recycled. 

Going even further, you could also use old clothes for making costumes. Another great way to give them a second life. 

Forest School 

Many local areas now host forest schools where older children can go for a few days a week to learn about the importance of forests, how to live in them and respect the wildlife that lives there. 

Some forest schools provide camping trips, while others are just weekly classes. Search locally to discover if you’ve got a forest school and how they run. 

If you want your child to experience more of the great outdoors and have a deeper respect for the natural environment, signing them up to forest school could help in all of these ways. 

Photo Scrapbook

Many children love playing photographer, so why not encourage their natural curiosity and creativity and go on a photo scrapbook adventure. 

Provide them with a camera, whether it’s an old phone or an old fashioned polaroid, and then go out on walks to see what you can find together. 

When you get home, print out their pictures and add them to a scrapbook. You can even take it a step further by helping them to use the computer to learn more about the plants or wildlife that you found. 

Bike Adventure 

According to data from 2019, there is a steep decline in children picking up bike riding. 

Bike riding is not only a more sustainable form of transport but also a life skill that can support children in many areas of their development. 

Learning to ride a bike this summer should be on your bucket list. 

If your child is already confident on a bike, now’s the perfect time to book out lots of outdoor adventures. 

Studies prove, that the more time we spend outside, the better for our mental wellbeing, but also that when children enjoy their natural environment, they are more conscious of maintaining it. 

Litter Pick Walk

Litter is still a problem that tarnishes our earth and damages the local wildlife, but we can turn it around. 

Litter picking used to be something you would get forced to do at school, but now more people are treating it as an environmental hobby, litter picking during runs and walks. 

Get your children in on the cleanup, and whether you’re walking somewhere or just out for a family walk, make it a challenge to see who can collect the most. 

Build Animal Shelters 

As the destruction of many natural habitats continues, more animals are finding themselves without a home. 

If you have a garden, you can support this environmental challenge by creating safe havens for birds and other animals in your backyard. 

Children love the idea of seeing more animals in their own space, and you can even go so far as to film the activity and show them in the morning. Who doesn’t love watching a hedgehog find a new home? 

There are many places you can purchase kits from or free tutorials on YouTube. 

Creating Hedgehog hotels, birdhouses, and even bug islands. 

All of these creatures and critters make a big impact on our environment, and the more we educate our children about their care, the more they will thrive and continue to help us create a better world. 

We may now have a roadmap out of the UK lockdown, but site safety still remains paramount as we await for the vaccination roll out and ensure that the spread of covid-19 finally stalls.  Construction work across the UK has continued during many of the UK lockdowns, as both essential works have needed to be carried out, and the government has leant on the continuation of the sector to help keep the economy going. 

Site safety has been hugely stepped up from the usual health and safety checks as companies have been consistently testing key works to help prevent any covid-19 infections.  If you’re working towards creating a safer site, both now and post-covid we’ve listed how making a small change to grab hire can support you on this journey. 

1) A Clear Site

Social distancing has been one of the biggest changes to help sites to resist the spread of covid-19. And while it’s not always easy to distance yourself on a site with the many intricate pieces of work that needs doing between team members, there are ways you can limit the need for unnecessary contact. 

One way in which grab hire is supporting a safe site is by creating more space on-site with the removal of waste.  Waste can take up large areas of a site which could instead be used for solo work.  By having a regular grab hire lorry collect waste and disposed of materials, you can maintain a clear site that provides extra space for distancing. 

2) Workflow 

During the UK lockdowns, it’s been essential for sites to limit the number of people on site. However, productivity has still had to remain high to meet deadlines and keep the work flowing. 

To support workflow, our grab hire lorries can schedule regular waste removals to ensure that work doesn’t stop due to a messy or disorganised site.  When waste starts to get in the way, work can slow down and disrupt the productivity of the site. 

3) Reducing Hazards

Large amounts of waste on a site cause a health and safety hazard in normal circumstances let alone during the UK lockdowns.  As waste can quickly pile up, or get blown around the site with bad weather, it then increases the risk of someone tripping or slipping on waste. 

When an accident occurs it both stalls workflow and means that interpersonal contact needs to be undertaken to support the person who is injured. During the pandemic, this then increases the spread of covid-19 as people have to come in close contact.  Regular removal of waste with a grab hire lorry ensures that all hazards are removed from the site. 

4) Public Access

If you are working on a site within the public environment your site mustn’t disrupt or cause harm to the surrounding public.  While you may consider a skip for your waste management on a public site, this can become a hazard as it can sit there for weeks.

A skip can also be difficult to manoeuvre in a public space that has limited or restricted access.   Instead, a grab hire lorry can collect rubbish and waste from hard to reach spaces, and be done within 30 minutes. This helps to limit any build-up of rubbish in a public environment and ensure that the site has extra space to continue work. 

5) Limiting Unnecessary Labour 

As we’ve already mentioned, at present many sites are limiting their team size to manage and control the potential spread of covid-19. This means that many sites can really do without unnecessary labour.  When many sites hire a skip this can cause extra labour, as someone has to manage what’s entering the skip, be in charge of filling it, and helping the collection of the skip.

In reality, a skip takes up a lot of unnecessary manpower.  However, with a grab hire lorry, such as our team at AJ Grab Hire, we come and collect your waste from the site and our team manages the whole process. The only thing you need to do is show us where the waste has been placed.  As we all continue to make sites safer and keep projects running on time, it’s worth considering which elements on your site can be enhanced to increase safety and productivity.  Contact our team at AJ Grab Hire today for a quote. 

Last year, The Countryside Alliance reported a 300% rise in fly-tipping in some areas as local authorities closed recycling centres during the covid-19 pandemic. 

But as the UK has been in and out of lockdowns, and with various tier systems implemented, it appears that the rise in fly-tipping has continued in strength as we enter 2021.

Local authorities have struggled to maintain basic services and have been put under a huge amount of strain over the past year, which has meant the fight against fly-tipping has been mostly left to campaigners and members of the public. 

ClearWaste, an app that allows the public to report fly-tipping, shows nearly 4,000 examples of fly-tipping in England alone. People have also taken to social media sites to also try and raise awareness and encourage people to speak out. 

Fly-tipping is not only unnecessary, but it also causes harm to the environment, wildlife and in some rare circumstances people’s homes. 

Regions Raise Their Concerns 

Reports across local regions have been showing just how far and wide the extent of the fly-tipping problem truly is, with local newspapers regularly reporting on the cost incurred by councils and the damage being done in the areas. 

In February 2021 West Lothian Council confirmed that it had spent £50,000 of taxpayers money on clearing fly-tipped rubbish. The council’s team reportedly collected nearly 73 tonnes of waste between October 2020 and December 2020. 

Havering Council reports that fly-tipping costs the council approximately £1m each year. Havering is regularly in the top 10 of London boroughs carrying out enforcement action against fly-tippers. 

According to the latest figures from Basildon council, more than 4,300 fines have been handed out to fly-tippers over the past year. 

In Grantham, three tonnes of concrete and construction waste were dumped by the canal in early February causing rubbish to contaminate the water.

Reports from Ely Cambridgeshire, saw local villagers confront the council due to a large amount of fly-tipped rubbish dumped in the area. Numerous residents reported it to East Cambridgeshire Council but in the end, residents took it upon themselves to remove it. 

Milton Keynes reported 4,304 fly-tipping incidents between April and December last year, with a monthly average of nearly 500 piles of rubbish a month being dumped. 

It seems no matter where you are in the UK, fly-tipping is becoming a serious problem, costing councils money and damaging the local landscape. 

Landfill Tax Increase 

Unfortunately, the rise in fly-tipping may be no closer to an end due to the consistent increase in UK landfill tax. 

Landfill tax has increased by 700% over the past 16 years up to 2014, and many believe this has largely contributed to the reduced use of landfill sites and the increase in fly-tipping. 

The National Audit Office believes that the rise in landfill tax contributed to a 65% fall in waste going to landfill, and spoke out on the fact telling reporters, “the move has incentivised more illegal disposal of waste.” 

A full report on the landfill tax created by The National Audit urges the government to do more when it comes to environmental taxes, as at present there is little evidence between the tax and how it supports environmental issues such as fly-tipping. 

Taking Action 

One thing that is apparent from the current fly-tipping problem sweeping across the UK is the number of local communities who are taking action. 

Litter-pickers and social media pages dedicated to reporting local fly-tipping have dramatically increased over the past year, as more locals look to combat the problem with their community spirit. 

One litter-picking group in Sunderland has tripled in members during the lockdown period as people take to the streets to keep it clean and report on any large amounts of waste. 

Rogue Waste Removers 

As well as taking local action, more people must become aware of rogue traders who are operating under false pretences. 

Unfortunately, if you’re not aware of what to ask or what to look out for, you can believe the people you’re paying are going to remove your waste responsibly; only to then discover that yourself and the rogue trader can be fined. 

There are many harrowing stories of people being conned by rogue traders, who in the end take peoples money and dump their rubbish. 

One report from London found a man fell victim to a scam waste collector in November 2020. He was overcharged by more than £1,000, only to later find the waste had been dumped in his neighbours garden. He was left to clear up the rubbish himself and never saw his money again. 

As the UK government website states, paying someone who fly-tips rubbish harms the environment, undermines accredited traders, and carries a criminal charge. 

To avoid further UK fly-tipping and to keep yourself safe against rogue waste removers ensure to follow these guidelines; 

• Always check that the waste remover has a website with reviews and testimonials from customers. 
• Check that they are registered with the Environment Agency and Local Council 
• Under UK law all waste removal businesses have a legal obligation to keep a Duty of Care Certificate or Waste Transfer Note that documents every load of waste that leaves the premises. Your waste removal company should provide you with this free of charge. 
• Check that the trader carries a Waste Carriers Licence 

As a licensed waste remover, At AJ Grab Hire we work on commercial and domestic projects, and can support you in removing any waste in a responsible and ethical way.