Turn the tide on coastal debris

RE “TIDE of plastic devastates marine food chain” (News, 27 January). No one who has walked along the Scottish coastline can have failed to notice the increasing tide of plastic debris, interwoven with lines of seaweed or bobbing just off-shore. Of course, it is unsightly but much more significant is the harm done to marine life.

So surely the time for hand-wringing is past. Individual citizens have responded well to the call to substitute bags for life for disposable bags and some communities have declared themselves plastic-bag free. But we really need stronger leadership from ­government, industry and ­major retailers.

Let’s return the shoreline to shells and driftwood, not the discards of yesterday’s shopping trip.

Gavin Corbett, Green councillor 
for Fountainbridge, Edinburgh