Virgin Media staff clean up Musselburgh Beach

10 September 2019

Musselburgh Beach in East Lothian, Scotland, has had a summer clean up thanks to staff and volunteers from Virgin Media.

A team of 20 people took to Musselburgh beach to collect 10 large bags of litter from the beach on Wednesday 4 September.

Virgin Media employees donated their spare time to clean up Musselburgh beach as part of its community engagement projects in locations across the UK. Virgin Media will also be sponsoring the Honest Toun Family Day at Musselburgh Racecourse on Sunday 29 September.

Musselburgh beach is an important site for the local community. It has views over the Firth of Forth, which is rich in bird life and has been designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest, making it a hotspot for wildlife enthusiasts.

The beach also lays claim to having the 134-mile long John Muir path pass alongside it, which makes it a popular destination for dedicated ramblers and casual walkers alike.

In May, Virgin Media met with MSP Paul Wheelhouse, Minister for Energy, Connectivity and the Islands, in Musselburgh to discuss the company’s commitment to expanding its ultrafast network in the area and additional locations across Scotland.

He was given a tour of a Virgin Media dig site in the historic town, which is part of the larger rollout in East Lothian that will connect more than 6,000 homes and businesses by the end of the year to the fastest widely available network in the UK, providing average top speeds of 516Mbps.

This will be more than 26 times faster than the average speed in East Lothian (19.5Mbps*) and means customers can perform multiple tasks online.

Julie Agnew, Regional Director for Scotland, said: “We’re extremely proud of all our staff who gave up their free time to clean up the much-loved Musselburgh beach. We know it’s a place where both local Musselburgh residents and visitors spend time connecting with people – whether that’s getting involved in a community event, going on strolls with their friends or playing with their families.”


Ends

Notes to Editors

*The average download broadband speed in East Lothian is 19.5Mbps. Source: Ofcom Connections Nations 2018 report.

About Virgin Media

Virgin Media offers four multi award-winning services across the UK and Ireland: broadband, TV, mobile phone and landline. 

Our dedicated, ultrafast network delivers the fastest widely-available broadband speeds to homes and businesses and we’re expanding this through our Project Lightning programme, which could extend our network to up to 17 million premises. 

Our interactive Virgin TV service brings live TV, thousands of hours of on-demand programming and the best apps and games to customers through a set-top box, as well as on-the-go through tablets and smartphones. 

Virgin Mobile launched the world’s first virtual mobile network and offers fantastic value and innovative services with 4G connectivity. We are also one of the largest fixed-line home phone providers in the UK and Ireland. 

Virgin Media is part of Liberty Global, the world’s largest international TV and broadband company. Liberty Global connects 21 million customers through operations in 10 countries across Europe subscribing to 45 million TV, broadband internet and telephony services. It also serves 6 million mobile subscribers and offers WiFi service through 12 million access points across its footprint. 

Press contacts

Jamie Clarke, Virgin Media – 0333 000 2984, press@virginmedia.co.uk

Twitter: @VirginMediaCorp