A unique experiment being carried out in Hounslow on Monday (December 16) aims to show how much litter is dropped in a single day.

Sweepers will only clean the southern side of Hounslow High Street during the day, leaving rubbish to pile up on the other half.

The entire street will be cleaned at 6am but the northern half will not be swept again until 4.30pm that evening.

Hounslow Highways, which is responsible for keeping the borough's streets grime free, hopes the contrast will help shame litterbugs into cleaning up their act.

It has teamed up with Keep Britain Tidy to run the experiment, which is part of the charity's 'Which Side of the Fence are you on?' campaign, in a bid to reveal the extent of the problem.

Littering costs an estimated £1 billion a year to clear up in the UK; in Hounslow alone about £3.2m is spent each year cleaning the streets.

Keep Britain Tidy's chief executive Phil Barton said: "The answer to solving the litter problem that blights our country is in our own hands. We need to take responsibility for our own behaviour and do one simple thing – put our rubbish in a bin."

The Chronicle revealed last week how litter levels have shot up in Hounslow, according to figures from Keep Britain Tidy.

Hounslow Highways has responded by introducing more street cleaning teams, while council chiefs have pledged to get tough on litter louts, issuing more on-the-spot fines for those caught in the act.