Single-use Plastics

Baroness Boycott Excerpts

Thursday 27th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park]

The plastic bag tax itself has not put any additional costs on to local authorities; on the contrary, it has raised substantial funds, which have been deployed through local charities in the areas where it has been collected. On the broader point about the cost of tackling unnecessary or avoidable waste, that is central to what we are trying to achieve in the Environment Bill. Taking the Bill in its totality, it is about shifting the emphasis away from consumer responsibility towards producer responsibility, on the understanding that most consumers do not welcome unnecessary waste from the products that they buy.

[Baroness Boycott (CB)]

My Lords, further to the noble Baroness’s question about banning plastics altogether, at the moment the supermarkets seem to be having their cake and eating it. They are charging us for our plastic bags but not all of that money is going to charity. Some of it is being kept by the supermarkets. Furthermore, they have developed a very tidy line in bags for life. I gather from a recent report that, on average, every family in England has 54 of these bags, which are made of much tougher plastics. On top of that, can the Government not use this year to come up with some systematic, countrywide system to tell people what to do with their plastics—which is which and how to dispose of them? It is a total muddle.

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park]

There is no doubt that there has been an upsurge in the use of so-called bags for life, but the net impact of the plastic bag tax has unquestionably been superb for those interested in reducing unnecessary plastic waste. The noble Baroness’s second point, about the ease of recycling, is absolutely right. In the Environment Bill, which has been introduced in the other place and will be here later in the year, we commit to making recycling easier and ensuring a more consistent, comprehensive service right across the country to avoid exactly that confusion, which exists from local authority to local authority. The Bill introduces legislation requiring all local authorities to collect a core set of recyclable materials—plastic bottles, plastic pots, tubs and trays, glass, metal, paper and card, food and garden waste—from households and businesses in England from 2023.