“THOUGHTLESS” litterbugs have thrown rubbish – collected hours earlier during a specially organised clean-up – back into the River Tyne.

Friends of the River Tyne spent several hours on Saturday cleaning up the river.

Volunteers filled four skip loads of rubbish, with items ranging from a fridge and microwave to general litter and tree branches removed.

But a spokeswoman for East Lothian Council said: “Sometime between Saturday evening and Monday morning, a thoughtless individual or group of people decided it appropriate to remove some of the contents of a skip placed near Riverside Drive and throw a bike, two scooters and a couple of bags of rubbish back in.”

Of the material collected, 98 per cent of it will be processed for recycling to compost and other reusable materials and the river was left looking tidy, with Keep Scotland Beautiful and Britain in Bloom judges visiting in the coming weeks.

The work was split between picking up litter near the paths and on the riverbanks and in the river, where several branches were removed.