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Rats plaguing the streets of Liverpool should be shot by trained marksmen, a councillor has suggested.

Steve Radford, leader of the city's Liberal Party, made the suggestion during a wider debate about hunting.

He said that while he was opposed to recreational hunting, he would be "happy" to trial the shooting of rats as part of a "professional" pest control system.

City Mayor Joe Anderson described the suggestion as "silly and absurd".

Shooting vermin was "dismissed many years ago" as a system of pest control, Mr Anderson, of the Labour-controlled authority, added.

Mr Radford, who represents the city's Tuebrook and Stoneycroft ward, said some terraced streets had a rat problem.

He said the council had spent £1.5m repairing walls that he claimed had been damaged by the rodents.

"We have an overwhelming outbreak of vermin in Liverpool," he said, adding: "Alleyway walls are collapsing where rats are burrowing underneath them.

"The poisoning programme isn't working. I think its inhumane that it causes the rats to slowly die.

"But more importantly the poison isn't killing the rats, they are becoming immune to it."

He said his plan would involve a "good professional system" where shooting clubs would be invited to "come at set times to cull the rats".

Mr Anderson said he had not seen any evidence of rats "eating bricks and through walls" and that Mr Radford's suggestion "doesn't deserve any credibility at all".

"It's silly and absurd to think we would allow people to shoot vermin in the street," he added.

He said limiting food waste on the streets and running poising programmes were "the most effective and cost effective way" of dealing with the problem.

Ian Furlong, director of Independent Pest Control and Hygiene Services Ltd in Liverpool, agreed the best way to prevent rat infestations was to keep food waste in closed bins.

He said shooting rats on city streets "is never going to happen" and stressed rats are not immune to poisoning.