MONMOUTHSHIRE councillors agreed to eliminate the sale of single-use plastic bottles in council owned buildings during a meeting earlier tonight.

The original motion was put forward by Labour group leader, cllr Dimitri Batrouni, which asked fellow councillors to back his plan to prohibit single-use plastic water bottles in council owned buildings.

But this was amended to reduce or eliminate the sale of single-use bottles in council owned buildings.

Cllr Dimitri Batrouni said it is estimated the UK uses around 15 million plastic bottles per day and that within a decade the world’s oceans could hold one kilogram of plastic for every three kilograms of fish.

He said 80 per cent of these 15 million plastic bottles are not recycled.

He said: “Frankly this is a startling statistic and one that I wasn’t aware of. A number of bottles end up in our rivers and eventually in our oceans – this has consequences on our environment.

“We are not going to solve the problem. It’s about moving in the right direction.”

He added: “It is the principle there are consequences to using plastic water bottles.”

Cllr Batrouni said Monmouthshire should lead the way to prohibit the sale of single-use plastic water bottles as it would have been the first council in Wales to do so.

Cllr Bob Greenland, cabinet member for leisure, said he could not support the original motion.

He said: “We receive a level of income selling water at our leisure centres that is a fact which enables us to keep other frontline services going.”

Councillors also approved for the motion to go before the select committee to be worked on further.