WITH reference to the recent letters regarding litter, may I on behalf of the Friends of York Walls give support to the City of York Council staff, who are carrying out a magnificent job of keeping our city centre clear of rubbish?

This is regardless of who are the litterbugs.

The photograph accompanying the letters showed an overloaded litter bin, which was to my mind not representative of the monitoring that we have observed.

Instead of naming and shaming, Friends of York Walls prefer to educate by example.

You may see us out and about on the walls, assisting our community partners, the council, in these difficult financial times.

Chris Dowell (secretary to the Friends of York Walls), Ullswater, Woodthorpe, York.

• WELL done and thank you to our refuse services who, within three to four hours on Monday morning, had the back alleys in the Barbican area of York cleared up.

With the university year ending, our alleys were clogged with black bags and other larger items of rubbish.

These were put out over the Friday/Saturday/Sunday period.

Unfortunately, on Sunday evening somebody or something had rifled through or driven over the bags and burst them, with contents strewn all over the place, Monday being the day for the collection of our waste.

The refuse man who collects the bags and sticks them at the end of the alleys ready for the waste truck to collect had a thankless task that, as usual, he put his back into.

However, the task was beyond his usual remit, reinforcements were sent for and a marvellous job done, so a big thank-you to all concerned.

Pat Bowness, Barbican Road, York.