Packaging Waste (Data Reporting) (England) Regulations 2023

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Tuesday 21st February 2023 Grand Committee

Moved by

[Lord Benyon]

That the Grand Committee do consider the Packaging Waste (Data Reporting) (England) Regulations 2023.

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Benyon) (Con)]

My Lords, the regulations were laid before the House on 9 January. The date of laying is the same as in the other place.

These regulations are essential secondary legislation needed to implement extended producer responsibility for packaging. Extended producer responsibility will move the full cost of dealing with packaging waste away from households, local taxpayers and councils and on to its producer. Producers will pay fees to cover the cost of collecting and treating household packaging waste handled by local authorities.

This means that, for the first time, producers will be responsible for the cost of managing their packaging once it reaches its end of life. This will encourage businesses to think carefully about how much packaging they use, make packaging easily recyclable and encourage the use of reusable and refillable packaging. This will help reduce the amount of unsustainable packaging that is produced and used each year, reducing the damaging impacts that materials such as plastic are having on our global environment.

These measures will also help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by more than 2.2 million tonnes by 2033—the equivalent of 5.1 million barrels of oil—as the creation of new packaging using virgin materials is reduced and producers are incentivised to manage resources more efficiently. This will contribute to our commitment to decarbonise all sectors of the UK economy and achieve net zero by 2050.

In addition, the shift of cost from local authorities to producers will provide an estimated £1.2 billion of funding to local authorities across the UK each year for managing packaging waste, easing the pressure on squeezed council budgets.

We set out the intention to introduce extended producer responsibility in the 25-year environment plan and in the 2019 manifesto. Working with the devolved Administrations, we have agreed to introduce extended producer responsibility for packaging at a UK level.

I now turn to the details of this instrument. These regulations will require packaging producers to collect and report data on the amount and type of packaging they supply from March 2023, or from January 2023 if they hold this data. This data is required to calculate producers’ recycling obligations and the extended producer responsibility fees that these producers will pay to cover the costs of managing household packaging waste from 2024.

Packaging producers already report data on packaging under the current producer responsibility regulations. These new regulations will refocus the obligation on to producers, who have the most influence over what packaging is used. They will require producers to report more information than they do currently about the type of packaging they produce. Larger producers will also be required to increase the frequency of their reporting from once to twice per year.

We expect these data reporting regulations to be in force for only one year, after which they will be revoked and replaced by new producer responsibility obligations (packaging and packaging waste) regulations, which will be laid later in 2023 and will contain similar provisions relating to data collection and reporting. These data regulations will apply to England only, but similar regulations are being progressed in parallel in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. My officials have worked closely with the relevant departments in the devolved Administrations in the development of this legislation.

A full impact assessment for the packaging extended producer responsibility scheme has been prepared and laid alongside this instrument. The impacts of these specific regulations on business are limited to the additional data collection and reporting requirements, and familiarisation with the new regulations.

When extended producer responsibility is introduced in 2024, there will be additional costs for businesses that handle packaging through the fees they will be obligated to pay. This will result in a net gain for the public sector, as producers make payments for the costs of managing household packaging waste by local authorities.

To reduce the burden on small producers, we will retain the current de minimis threshold for producers who are obligated to pay fees to cover disposal costs. To ensure that all packaging is accounted for, packaging manufacturers and importers will be responsible for paying fees for any unfilled packaging that they sell to producers under the de minimis threshold. This will result in more packaging being reported in the system and the costs being shared more fairly among producers, while protecting the smallest businesses from burdensome reporting obligations.

In conclusion, I reiterate that the measures in these regulations are crucial for enabling the implementation of extended producer responsibility and the associated environmental benefits. I commend these draft regulations to the Committee.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

My Lords, we welcome this SI and agree with a number of points that the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, made. The SI will enable data collection to inform fees to be paid by producers under the new extended producer responsibility for packaging scheme. A number of producers have made progress in making their packaging more recyclable and reusable. We hope that the EPR scheme will accelerate this once it is fully on stream, but the Government will need to keep on top of the data and ensure that industry delivers.

This SI was previously withdrawn and replaced, but the Explanatory Memorandum makes no reference to this. Will the Minister confirm what has changed? Was it just correcting some minor typos or is there any wider policy change?

This is a UK-wide policy, but the primary legislation allows SIs to be made in relation to England only. Paragraph 6.2 of the Explanatory Memorandum says that the Welsh and Scottish Governments and the Northern Ireland Executive will lay their own SIs in due course. What are the timescales, and is the relevant Northern Ireland department able to do this in the absence of a functioning Northern Ireland Executive?

In the other place, the Minister, Rebecca Pow, said:

“A new digital system is being created to handle it all, which is critical.”—[Official Report, Commons, Fifth Delegated Legislation Committee, 2/2/23; col. 8.]


Can I ask for more details about this, as the Government’s IT projects rarely go to plan? Is the system on time and within budget? Is it still being tested or is it ready to be rolled out?

The Minister talked about the Government’s environmental improvement plan on implementing EPR for packaging. However, I want to ask in particular about the statement in the plan that says:

“We are engaging with stakeholders to shape the future vision of waste reforms through industry wide sprint events, deep dive sessions and fortnightly forums.”


Will the Minister tell us more about the engagement that has taken place so far and confirm that the Government are engaging not just with industry stake- holders but with environmental groups?

I also ask about the flexibility in the system should any issues arise. If the first tranches of data are not of high enough quality, how long would it take to resolve this? If we end up with issues around the thresholds, how quickly could Defra address them? What other initiatives are being brought forward to address the waste crisis overall?

From my understanding, around 1,800 more businesses will now face reporting obligations, but does the Minister have a precise number of businesses affected? The Government’s own impact assessment, which the noble Baroness talked about, suggests that the number could be as high as 15,000 or as low as zero. What is the figure, and what will the Minister do to ensure that the legislation means something?

Finally, can the Minister be clear that the new system will improve the quality of data compared with the one it is replacing? Without clarity or understanding of our actions, this draft SI will be what we have become used to: more of the same dithering and delay. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I am grateful to both noble Lords for their support for this proposal. I will seek to answer their questions.

The noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, asked whether it is going ahead and whether there will be any delays. It will go ahead and there will be no delays. It will be at the end of the year, as planned.

The noble Baroness is right to ask about communications, which of course will vary by producer. This partly answers the question from the noble Lord, Lord Khan, about engagement. We have gone through an exhaustive process of engagement with business and with other organisations interested in this issue. That has included webinars, one-to-one sessions, and consultation with trade bodies and businesses in general. We do not see this as a completed work because, as the noble Baroness pointed out, this is a short-lived legislative measure that will be replaced, so we will have to continue to consult. We will consult as we roll out the whole extended producer responsibility plan.