Plastic bags are more than an environmental hazard - they're a killer. And Harrogate district residents sent 25 million to landfill sites in 2007.

Now the Harrogate Advertiser is backing the council's campaign to cut carrier bag use across the district, and calling on supermarkets to play their part.

Borough councillors Andrew Jones and Don Mackenzie have asked the council to back a motion designed to discourage the use of plastic bags.

And though it's likely to be approved, the council could face a big struggle to get major retailers on board.

Coun Jones said: "I want to reduce the amount of plastic bags we use and encourage local retailers to move away from plastic bags.

"They are based on a finite resource - oil - and they take 400 years to break down."

Coun Richard Cooper, the borough council's cabinet member for the environment, will back the motion in his report to the full council, after which councillors will vote on the matter.

"It's one of the biggest impacts that we can have locally, that will help the environment, " he said.

Of the Harrogate supermarkets, the Co-op has been most positive about the possibility of going plastic-bag free.

The company will make a decision about introducing a ban in three months' time, after seeing how successful a similar scheme is in Hebden Bridge.

The other major supermarkets in Harrogate are reluctant to introduce a ban.

A spokeswoman for Asda said the company currently had no intention of scrapping plastic bags.

"We're trying to re-educate our customers, " she said.

"No other retailer has brought in a ban – it might frustrate customers, " she added.