Blake's red socks return to Auckland sands

Lady Pippa and Callum Erskine help clean up Philomel Reserve in Bayswater. Photo / Brett Phibbs

Sir Peter Blake's widow, Lady Pippa Blake, donned a pair of his famous red socks to take part in a beach clean-up on the North Shore yesterday.

Lady Pippa is visiting New Zealand for the annual Sir Peter Blake Leadership Awards but took time out to lend a hand to pupils of Sir Peter's former school, Bayswater Primary School, for another of The Sir Peter Blake Trust's initiatives - Care for our Coast.

The red socks were an emblem of Sir Peter's America's Cup-winning campaigtn in 1995.

Lady Pippa, with seven pupils and three Westpac staff, picked up rubbish at Bayswater Beach on the Philomel Reserve for more than an hour.

The trust started the Care for our Coast programme

in 2004, and it is offered to schools all over New Zealand as part of environmental awareness education.

Since 2004, more than 342 cleanups have been organised throughout the country.

Yesterday's cleanup coincided with New Zealand Leadership Week, and the Sir Peter Blake Leadership Awards to be presented tomorrow.

Lady Pippa said she hoped the cleanup initiative would encourage pupils to become environmental leaders.

"We're inspiring them to be leaders and to share what they've learnt and show it's cool to pick up litter. Its good fun. Its good to see first hand the enthusiasm."

General manager Vicki Watson said the aim was to encourage pupils to care for the environment, as Sir Peter did.

"We're encouraging the children that if they love the environment that they have to go out and do something."

She said tallying and looking at the types of litter afterwards gave the pupils an understanding of how the litter got there.

The message hit home for Bayswater pupil Callum Erskine who encouraged the public to stop littering.

"People should take more responsibility for their rubbish and stop leaving it lying around. There's lots of glass, lots of everything."

The Sir Peter Blake Leadership Award winners will be announced tomorrow.