A BRADFORD charity is urging residents to report sightings of discarded laughing gas canisters via a new app.

Create Strength Group, which helps those with addiction issues, has developed a free app where people can easily record locations of dumped nitrous oxide canisters.

The charity said it developed the app in a bid to learn more about the scale of the problem in the area - and also to find out where laughing gas is commonly used so people can be educated about the effects and dangers of it.

Nitrous oxide has become one of the most commonly used recreational drugs by 16 to 24-year-olds.

Possession of it for drug use was made a criminal offence in November.

Bradford was one of the first cities in the UK to raise the alarm about the use of laughing gas.

Just last month, the Telegraph & Argus reported on concerns about nitrous oxide canisters being used and dumped outside a primary school in Bradford on a daily basis.

Since that report, the school's headteacher told the T&A there had been a "slight reduction" in the number of canisters being discarded outside the premises.

Dave Memery, Create Strength Group chief executive, said: "We launched the Create Strength Group Nitrous Oxide Project app in response to pressing local concerns and clear evidence of increased nitrous oxide use in Bradford.

"The T&A recently reported the risk of young children being introduced to nitrous oxide canisters dumped by users near a Bradford primary school.

"We wanted to find a way of involving concerned members of the public who care about their community to help us collect more information about the scale of the problem.

"We discovered one of the best ways of doing this was to create an easy-to-use, confidential, data regulation-compliant app.

"Using this free app, we hope many of your readers will upload photographic evidence of what we now believe is a significant problem.

"Photographs can be automatically and anonymously tagged with date, time and location data.

"The data can then be mapped."

The charity's website states: "Create Strength Group plans to use this information to help build and analyse hotspots of nitrous oxide misuse and help educate people on the effects and dangers of this 'high'."

The Create Strength Group Nitrous Oxide Project app can be downloaded from the Create Strength Group website via https://www.createstrengthgroup.org/nitrous

The Create Strength Group works with Bradford Council and other organisations in the city.