LEISURE centres across Oxfordshire will be asked how soon they can replace chocolate and crisps in vending machines with healthy snacks.

Calorie-crunching councillors at Oxfordshire's Health Improvement Board have made the request as part of a grand plan to make the county slimmer.

Fast food-free zones in schools and council offices, cooking courses for the poor and advertising for food banks are among the other fat-busting ideas on the table.

Board members, leisure providers and private companies cooked up the concepts at a slimming summit in April.

On Thursday, the board's principal officer Donna Husband answered questions about how the recommendations could be implemented.

Board member Hilary Hibbert-Biles, a Conservative county councillor for Chipping Norton, launched discussions by asking Ms Husband: "How did leisure providers react to healthy vending machines idea? Because I note they are all full of chocolate bars.

"Did they agree they would look at this again?"

Ms Husband said while a lot of district councils responsible for leisure services were keen on the idea, they had to agree realistic contracts with private leisure companies, so it was "not always easy".

West Oxfordshire District Council's leisure development manager Heather McCulloch told the board one of her council's leisure centre contracts was up for renewal and officers had already "started conversations" about providing more healthy snacks in leisure machines in a new contract.

But she warned the board some councils might only be a few years into a ten-year contract.

Mrs Hibbert-Biles responded: "I would have thought we don't want to wait ten years for these actions to come in."

Board vice-chairman and Oxford City Council deputy leader Ed Turner agreed and asked Ms Husband to chase an update from leisure service providers in each district to see what could be done by the next meeting on October 20.

Mrs Hibbert-Biles also floated the idea of asking leisure centres to hang up signs reminding visitors of NHS guidelines for daily exercise.

She said: "Last weekend I was at a leisure centre in Hertfordshire and wherever I went there were big boards saying 'are you going to do your 30 minutes today?'

"It's amazing how many people don't know you need to do 30 minutes of exercise a day and I don't see there is anything wrong with reminding people.

"If they don't want to do it, they can ignore it."

The board did not make any official recommendation on the issue.

Oxfordshire's "Healthy Eating Network", which has been tasked by the board to investigate the feasibility of community cooking courses and making school catering healthier, is due to report back to the board in the Autumn.