A councillor has launched a mission to rid Barnoldswick of plastic bags.

Town councillor Keith Bailey wants to provide each house in the town with a green shopping bag by the end of the year.

He said: "Plastic bags do not rot away in landfill and use up valuable resources in manufacture and transport. If people have a bag they can reuse it's better for the environment in many ways."

Coun Bailey wants Barnoldswick to be a plastic bag-free zone by the end of 2009, and eventually wants to supply green shopping bags to every house in West Craven. To achieve this, he is looking for volunteers to set up a committee to look at funding for the environmentally-friendly bags, which would be made of jute or recycled plastic, and methods of distribution.

The Mayor of Pendle, Coun Shelagh Derwent, has already pledged her support for the scheme. "When I met with her earlier this week she seemed to be excited by the idea," said Coun Bailey.

Sally Nicholson, chairman of Barnoldswick and West Craven Chamber of Trade and co-owner of Barnoldswick's The Good Life, said: "Anything that gets rid of dreaded plastic bags is fine by me. Keith contacted me and I brought it up at a meeting of the Chamber to see if anybody wanted to join the working party."

Mrs Nicholson said her shop had been selling "bags for life" for a number of years. "We are finding that all the supermarkets are jumping on the bandwagon of something that was once upon a time only found in shops of our ilk."

Mrs Nicholson said she could not speak for other members of the Chamber of Trade, but on a personal level believed the fewer carrier bags that were used the better. Some Barnoldswick traders have already started charging for bags or decided not to restock them when the current supply runs out.

Anyone interested in volunteering to help with the scheme should contact Coun Bailey on 01282 852286, email cllr.kbailey@googlemail.com or visit Fun and Games Toy Shop on Albert Road, Barnoldswick.