Plastic straws '˜one of the worst' things for pollution, says university

The University of Portsmouth has replaced the harmful straws with a more environmentally friendly straw made from recycled paper.

Paper straws will be available from all of the catering outlets in the university.

It comes after The News launched The Last Straw campaign, which aims to not only get rid of plastic straws in all bars and restaurants, but also to get coffee shops to offer discounts for people bringing in their own coffee cups.

More than 500,000 plastic straws are produced daily and globally, most are only used once.

Most of these will end up in oceans all around the world and take 200 years to biodegrade.

The announcement was made at the recent event See Bin, Sea Change event which took place at the university.

The University hopes that other businesses and organisations in the city will also ban the use of plastic straws, in the same way that Pryzm in Portsmouth and The Ship Inn in Hayling Island have.

Nick Leach, head of catering services at the University of Portsmouth, said: ‘I was inspired following a meeting with someone on the Isle of Wight who sells reusable water bottles.

‘Her own mission was to cut down the amount of plastic bottles that are used and this got me thinking.

‘I decided we needed to do our bit to help stop plastic pollution and this needed to be a campus-wide initiative.

‘Plastic straws are one of the worst items as they slip through the collection system and often get pushed out to sea via waste.’