VOLUNTEERS and council and emergency service officials have once again joined forces to help clear up a neighbourhood.

The monthly clean-up operation, which involves litter picking, graffiti cleaning and other general improvements to the area, this time focused on Haydon Wick.

Carla Littler, environmental health officer for Swindon Council, who joined neighbourhood wardens in a litter pick, said: "It's important because the community needs to know we're out here. It's a visible presence."

The clean-up operation involved officers from environment health, housing, commercial services, waste, parking services, community safety, neighbourhood wardens and even members of the fire and police.

Young people also took part in the work as part of their community orders, but organisers are hoping to get more help from the public.

During yesterday morning the two teams sent out cleaned off 248 graffiti tags, seven of which were offensive, including one that was racist.

There were also 90 bags of litter collected and one and a half tonnes of fly-tipping was cleared away.

Three people were spoken to regarding dog litter issues, four parking penalties were issued for parking on double yellow lines and three untaxed vehicles were given notices.

Cheri Wright, anti-social behaviour manager for the Community Safety Partnership, who organised the monthly clean-ups, said focusing on environmental issues was important.

"It's about breaking that whole cycle of things such as graffiti and litter," she said.

"More will get dumped because it makes people think people don't care."

She added that cleaning up an area can make it feel safer for residents.

Previous clean-ups have been done in Broadgreen and Pinehurst.

Miss Littler said: "In the areas we have gone into it has made a real difference, which means it is working."

One problem with the scheme is getting volunteers to come out on a Thursday morning is difficult because of work commitments.

Miss Littler added: "It's cold out here and sometimes it's the last thing anyone wants to do, but we would like to see more community engagement.

"The idea of these days is that we are working with the community so that the community can maintain it - we want it to be ongoing."

Organisers are keen to get the public more involved, particularly to help identify problems.

Rob Core, contracts manager for street cleaning, said that the week before the clean his team identify problems in the area that people can have dealt with for free.

He said that of all the disclaimers left for people to contact them, at present only 20 per cent are followed up.