Gavin Williamson, MP for South Staffordshire, has condemned the Canal & River Trust for not removing graffiti from a bridge in Wombourne.
The Canal & River Trust have rejected Gavin’s request to remove graffiti on and around the canal bridge in Wombourne. Gavin called on the Trust to remove the graffiti after a number of concerned residents contacted him over the matter. The bridge, next to the Round Oak pub, has been heavily vandalised with graffiti which could put the all-important bid to be named Best Kept Village in danger.
The Trust refused to remove the graffiti citing limited resources, meaning that they can only address offensive graffiti. The removal of the vandalism is a specialised task, especially when cleaning historic structures, using chemicals that will not contaminate river water.
Gavin said: “I cannot say how disappointed I am that unless abusive language is used this graffiti is allowed to remain on the structure and which I feel is an advert to encourage more people to carry on with this behaviour. This is both illogical and I am afraid a poor reflection on the Canal & River Trust.
“Whilst I accept that within all organisations budgets are tight I think it is absolutely ridiculous that local volunteers should ahve to undertake action in order to clean up this site. I think at the very minimum the Canal & River Trust should help and be willing to facilitate or allow a local team to clean this off and indeed I myself will go and lead a team to clean this up if they are unwilling to do so. Unless I am denied permission to clean the bridge, I will undertake the removal myself as I am very keen to try and improve this bridge for the local community and environment.