Over £2million spent cleaning the city streets

This was the highest amount spent clearing up litter anywhere outside Belfast where 10,822,911 was forked out by the ratepayer.

In neighbouring Strabane the figure was 654,602 and in Limavady 570,125.

The total bill across Northern Ireland as a whole was 34,019,931.

Environment Minister Edwin Poots said we could all save valuable pounds by cleaning up our streets and taking home our litter.

The Minister said: "We all share responsibility for tackling the blight of street litter.

"By changing our attitudes and behaviour, not only could we benefit financially, we can also improve the quality of our environment.

"Belfast City Council alone spent over 10.8million last year cleaning its streets.

"Eight other councils have spent more than 1million each on clearing up litter. This is money that could be spent on improving facilities and services for ratepayers.

"Naturally there is a variance between how much each council pays to clear up litter but the bottom line is that they are all paying too much."

The average daily cost of street cleaning in Northern Ireland is 93,150.68 across all 26 district councils.

"I ask everyone to think about how we dispose of our rubbish and to take pride in their local area," said Mr Poots. "Money your councils spend on cleaning litter from our street could be put to use improving other services such as our parks and playgrounds."