COUNCIL chiefs are hailing the success of a zero-tolerance approach to litter louts after Oxford was voted Britain’s cleanest city.

Readers of Conde Nast’s Traveller magazine voted the city the cleanest in the UK during its annual poll. More than 40,000 readers voted.

Since the city council’s Cleaner, Greener Oxford campaign was launched in November, 449 fixed penalty notices have been issued to people dropping litte.

Councillor John Tanner, executive board member for a cleaner Oxford said: “This is excellent news. Dropping litter is not tolerated in Oxford.

“We don’t want to fine people, but if we are prepared to fine them it encourages everyone to find a bin.

“The tough but fair approach has won the backing of local people and I’m sure the campaign has had a significant impact on making Oxford’s streets cleaner.

“Despite the very welcome big increase in tourists this summer we have broadly kept the city centre spick and span.”

The number of people visiting the city council’s Tourism Information Centre is the highest since the office moved to Broad Street six years ago.

Figures for July show 78,934 people visited the centre for advice about attractions, accommodation and events, up by 13,721 on the same month last year.

Cleaning the city centre and emptying its 160 bins costs the council more than £1m a year and sees more than 600 tonnes of rubbish collected annually.

Just two years ago, Cornmarket Street was branded an embarrassment because of its overflowing rubbish bins and litter scattered around.

However Mr Tanner said the efforts of McDonald’s, Burger King and KFC who now run their own litter patrols had also helped to clean-up the street.

Councillor Colin Cook, executive board member for city development, said: “I’m very pleased we have done as well as we have. There’s a noticeable difference on the city’s streets .”

Two weeks ago, it was revealed children as young as 10 can be fined for dropping rubbish in Oxford.