PEOPLE across Romsey are urged to get involved with giving their neighbourhood a spruce up ahead of an important birthday this year.

As the Queen looks forward to turning 90 years old on April 21 towns up and down the country are thinking of ways to celebrate it.

Mark Edgerley, town centre manager in urging people to get involved and over the weekend of March 4, 5, and 6, they hope people and businesses across town will join him in Clean for the Queen.

It’s part of a nationwide bid to clean up the country.

He has joined forces with litter campaigner Manuela Wahnon who hopes to fill 90 carrier bags with litter before then in a bid to get the streets clean.

He said: “Ideally we will get 90 people picking up a bag and putting them in the bin.

“It’s very much a do-it-yourself thing to try to encourage people to go out and take part in the programme.”

He added that he hoped to be able to clean the discarded chewing gum lying on the town’s streets later in March.

Manual said “it’s about changing people’s attitude”.

In Manuela’s words: “Filling one of those small carrier bags with discarded litter is easy to do. I’m hoping others will be inspired to do similarly, so we can show the rest of the country that we in Romsey are already contributing to the bigger picture ahead of the day.

“Why a carrier bag challenge? Because filling bag with litter that small, it could be achievable by everyone.”

The clean-up is ahead of planned events across the country to celebrate her birthday coinciding with a four-day event at Buckingham Palace from May 12 to 15.

In Romsey ideas are being floated to hold a street party in The Abbey ground on Sunday May 15 with children from each Romsey school producing something for a timeline around the Abbey reflecting each decade of her life.

Mr Edgerley said he hopes to get themed hanging baskets at the bus station, town hall and the Cornmarket and encourage businesses to put up red, white and blue window displays in the week leading up to the event in May.