Environmental Protection (Plastic Straws, Cotton Buds and Stirrers) (England) Regulations 2020

Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park Excerpts

Friday 10th July 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park]

That the draft Regulations laid before the House on 19 May be approved.

Relevant document: 16th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee

[The Minister of State, Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Department for International Development (Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park) (Con) [V]]

My Lords, the instrument before your Lordships, the Environmental Protection (Plastic Straws, Cotton Buds and Stirrers) (England) Regulations 2020, is being made to restrict the supply of single-use plastic straws, single-use plastic-stemmed cotton buds, and plastic drink stirrers to end users. An end user is the final recipient in the chain who will use the item for its intended purpose—for example, a customer using a straw to consume a drink.

We consulted on this measure between October 2018 and December 2018. On 22 May 2019, the summary of responses and the government response were published. A full impact assessment covering straws, and two regulatory triage assessments covering cotton buds and stirrers, are published alongside the Explanatory Memorandum. These regulations are a devolved matter and this instrument applies to England only.

I first want to address an issue raised by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which has now been addressed in the Explanatory Memorandum. These regulations were initially laid in March this year and were set to come into force in April. However, in light of the unprecedented situation this country has faced due to Covid-19, they were delayed to reduce the burden being placed on industry and to avoid adding further demands on local authorities. We decided to delay entry into force for a short time, while we were at the peak of the crisis. Delaying these regulations was only a temporary measure in response to the crisis. Our commitment to turning the tide on the widespread use of single-use plastics is as strong as ever, as we seek to limit our impact on the natural world.

Turning to the purpose of this SI, the Government are committed to eliminating plastic waste and pollution. Single-use plastic items are increasingly common, and their use and inappropriate disposal continue to raise significant environmental issues. Unlike other materials, such as paper or wood, plastic can persist in the environment for hundreds of years. When released into the environment, items such as plastic straws can endanger wildlife and damage habitats, as small plastic items are often mistaken for food by animals. Furthermore, plastic will eventually break down into microplastics, ending up in our soils and seas and permeating our food chains. The full impacts of the dangers of microplastics are still being uncovered.

Even when some single-use plastics are properly disposed of, they will typically end up in landfill or go off to be incinerated, which releases carbon into the atmosphere. Straws, cotton buds and stirrers in particular are unlikely to be recycled due to their small size, as sizeable effort is required to segregate and clean them. Therefore, action is needed to curtail the use of single-use plastics and their release into the environment.

The proposed measures in the resource and waste chapter of our Environment Bill will transition us towards a more circular economy and change the way that we use and consume resources. We have already seen a drop in demand for plastic straws and pledges from a number of corporations such as McDonald’s, Waitrose and Tetra Pak to find sustainable alternatives. These new regulations will support the voluntary actions being taken by industry, led by the UK Plastics Pact, while ensuring that all businesses move to more sustainable alternatives. Our current data shows that we use a staggering 4.7 billion straws, 1.8 billion plastic-stemmed cotton buds and 316 million plastic stirrers every year in England. This SI will drastically reduce the use of plastic straws, cotton buds and stirrers by an estimated 95%.

This intervention is a strong marker of the Government’s intent to clamp down on single-use plastic pollution and protect our environment. It will spur industry to innovate in this space, developing innovative alternatives such as new reusable or paper straws. When taken in conjunction with other parts of our policy approach to move towards a more circular economy, this will be another landmark moment, following our carrier bag charge and microbeads ban.

Plastic is, however, an incredibly useful and versatile material; its strength and relative light weight means that it can have a vital role to play in a range of applications. For instance, plastic straws can withstand high temperatures, such as in tea or coffee, and can be manufactured to bend or fit a particular shape. This allows for those suffering from ailments, for example motor neurone diseases, who struggle holding cups, to access hot and cold drinks as well as liquid foods. Therefore, we have included exemptions within these regulations for straws for accessibility, forensic, medical, and scientific uses, and cotton buds for forensic, medical, and scientific uses as well.

Plastic straws will be available through pharmacies without any requirement for proof of need. This will mean that relatives, friends, and carers could buy them on behalf of those who rely on these items. Similarly, we are allowing for catering establishments, such as restaurants and pubs, that supply food and drink ready for visitors to consume to continue to provide plastic straws on request, again without any proof of need. In these instances, it will be against the regulations to display and advertise that straws are being supplied in order to limit the impulse for people to request them without a need for them.

The regulations allow business-to-business sales—for example, between a manufacturer and a catering establishment—to ensure that businesses can supply items to those who need them. We have also exempted other establishments such as schools, care homes and prisons from the restrictions on plastic straws so that they can be made available for anyone in their care who may need one. Finally, there is also an exemption for plastic straws that are classed as packaging—for example, some medicines in pill form are packaged in straws, to be dispensed one at a time. These exemptions for medical, scientific and forensic purposes will be reviewed and updated as we move forward and as new technologies and evidence emerge.

We are determined to get this right, and it is vital that businesses and the public are informed about what they can and cannot do. Local authorities are obliged to ensure that guidance is published ahead of these regulations coming into force. To ensure compliance, we have given trading standards authorities the power that they require for this type of restriction—for example, to enter and examine premises that they suspect are in breach of the law. Anyone caught still supplying these items against the rules set out in this legislation could face civil sanctions, such as stop notices or a variable monetary penalty.

Of course, we hope that those enforcement measures will not be necessary. Industry is already making good progress in removing these items from the shelves, and public demand for them is falling—but the regulations need to have teeth to show that this Government take the issue of plastic pollution seriously.

The new regulations send a signal to industry and the general public that we need to think carefully about the products that we buy and the materials from which they are made. The regulations will help people to make more sustainable choices, and I commend them to the House.

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[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park [V]]

I thank noble Lords who have contributed to the debate today. In order for us to leave the environment in a better state than we found it, which is our commitment as a Government, it is essential that we have the right legislation in place to limit the impact of our use of resources on the natural world. Plastics cause incontrovertible harm to the marine and terrestrial environment and we need to act now. These measures are an important part of our wider strategy to tackle plastic pollution; they will serve as an important marker that our reliance on single-use plastics must be reduced.

I will do my best to answer the many questions raised throughout this fascinating debate. The noble Lord, Lord Oates, asked whether the exemptions were really necessary, and whether we could we not simply switch to biodegradable and other alternatives. The reality is that, until the technology becomes more reliable and improves, we believe that these exemptions are necessary. He asked, as did a number of other noble Lords, about the capacity of local authorities to enforce these new rules. I can tell noble Lords that my officials are working with MHCLG to complete a new burdens assessment on this new regulation. Any new burdens will be fully resourced.

My noble friends Lord Sheikh and Lady Hooper, and my near-neighbour, the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, all in different ways raised the international component of the issue that we are discussing. I emphasise that the UK has shown real global leadership. This is a huge problem: we are told that, by 2050, the oceans will contain more plastic than fish, as measured by waste. This is a really big issue. The UK has committed up to £70 million to boost global research and to support developing countries around the world to prevent plastic waste entering the ocean, as well as to develop sustainable manufacturing. This includes the Commonwealth Litter Programme, which is a £6 million programme supporting countries across the Commonwealth to develop national litter action plans, and the Commonwealth Clean Oceans Alliance. A technical assistance facility of up to £10 million has been made available to ODA-eligible members to support the implementation of the alliance’s many commitments. There is also the Global Plastic Action Partnership: the UK has committed just under £2.5 million to the World Economic Forum to help leading businesses to collaborate with NGOs and Governments to tackle marine plastic pollution—among many other things.

A number of noble Lords raised the obvious point that this is just one small step. The noble Lords, Lord Singh of Wimbledon, Lord Foulkes, Lord Mann and Lord Goddard, the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and my noble friends Lord Randall and Lady Gardner, all in various ways made the point that this is one step and we need many more. Of course, I and the Government recognise that much more needs to be done, and our resources and waste strategy clearly reflects that.

I would point out, however, that we have already introduced a world-leading ban on microbeads in rinse-off personal care products—it was a world first. We have reduced the use of single-use carrier bags by around 90% in the main supermarkets with the 5p carrier bag charge. We have committed over £100 million to support research and development around plastics, particularly the development of smart, sustainable plastic packaging, including alternatives to plastic. We have consulted on a suite of measures to reduce, reuse and recycle more. Among other things, we are creating a consistent service across England, ensuring that a minimum core set of materials is collected by all authorities. We are committed to reforming the current packaging waste regulations to financially incentivise producers to take greater responsibility for the environmental impact of the packaging that they put on the market.

We are committed to introducing a deposit return scheme for drinks containers in England and to introducing a new tax on plastic packaging that has less than 30% recycled content from April 2022, with any revenue from that going to fund investment in plastic waste and litter. We have also committed to removing consumer single-use plastics from central government offices; Defra, for example, one of the departments that I am representing here today, has already removed single-use plastic cups for sale within the department.

My noble friend Lord Moynihan raised a number of issues around extended producer responsibility and the merits or otherwise of biodegradable alternatives, a point that was also made by the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty. The Government are reviewing the implementation timeline for the proposed introduction of extended producer responsibility. It will be announced soon; I apologise that I am not able to put a date to that.

The thrust of our environment approach, and almost the most important part of our approach to tackling waste, is extended producer responsibility, which for the first time will place the lifetime responsibility for a product on the shoulders of those who manufacture that product. There is a massive incentive in there for manufacturers and producers of products to produce products that last or that can be easily recycled.

On the biodegradable alternatives, there is no doubt that innovative new packaging types could help reduce the environmental impact of plastic if it is disposed of in the right way. However, in the absence of clear standards, we are concerned that claims about the biodegradability of plastic-based products cannot always be verified, and in fact they are simply not always true. Defra and BEIS therefore published a call for evidence last year to help us look at standards or certification criteria for bio-based, biodegradable and compostable plastics, and to better understand their effects on the environment and our current waste system. We are currently analysing the responses that we have had, with a view to publishing a government response late in the summer.

The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, congratulated the Government on the exemptions that were included and asked that I commit that we continue to consult with stakeholder organisations. That point was also made by my noble friend Lord Holmes and I am happy to make that commitment here now.

I was asked whether we would be issuing guidance to businesses on how to work with the new regulations and the answer is yes. Defra will publish guidance for businesses and put it on the government website, GOV.UK, to assist them in complying with these new regulations. Local authorities, which ultimately will enforce the ban through trading standards officers, will also be required by the regulations to publish guidance on enforcement, and we will help them to do so.

My noble friend Lord McColl mentioned the problem of microplastics and suggested that that was a more important issue to be spending money on than, for example, climate change. These issues are not mutually exclusive. It is impossible to tackle climate change responsibly without also tackling broader environmental issues and working with nature-based solutions, and it is impossible to restore and protect the natural world in the way that he implies, with which I strongly agree, without also tackling climate change. We have no choice but to tackle both of those looming crises.

On the specific issue that he raised on microplastics, we have introduced one of the world’s toughest bans on microbeads in rinse-off personal care products. Microbeads, like all other forms of microplastics, do not biodegrade; they get smaller and smaller and accumulate in the environment. Our ban has eliminated that avoidable source of plastic pollution.

The noble Lord, Lord McConnell, mentioned the problem of mixed waste. He is right: there is an inconsistency in the manner in which waste is collected. One of the things that we are committed to doing is ensuring consistency at local authority level. He also made the point that driving further with this agenda would be good as part of our green recovery plans, and I am pleased that the Prime Minister has made building back greener and better a key priority not only of this Government but in our international work as well.

The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, asked when the second round of consultations would happen. That will be in early 2021. The noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, asked whether we were still committed to introducing DRS. Yes, we are absolutely committed to doing so and I can give that commitment now. The noble Baroness, Lady Jolly, asked why we have not been bolder. I hope that the answers I gave to previous questions will have reassured her somewhat.

The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, questioned the focus on something which represents a small percentage of the overall plastic problem. He is right, but 4.7 billion straws being used in England alone is not a small problem. Tackling these visible examples of what the noble Lord, Lord Mann, described as “our throwaway society” is, in itself, an educational process and alerts people to the problem of plastic more broadly.

The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, criticised the previous Prime Minister for using a derogatory term about environmental measures. Internationally, we have shown more leadership on climate change and environmental restoration than any country that I am aware of, doubling our climate finance to £11.6 billion, and leading the charge on making the case for nature-based solutions to climate change. We have a long history that we can be proud of. We were the first country to introduce legally binding emissions reduction targets and the first major economy to set net-zero targets by 2050. We are the top performer in the EU on resource efficiency and much more besides.

I recognise that I am running out of time. I apologise to noble Lords whose questions I have not answered. I have documented these and will write to them following this debate.

As I have outlined, the regulations will restrict the supply of single-use plastic straws, stirrers, and cotton buds; in doing so, reducing plastic pollution and its impact on the natural environment. We recognise that there is a great deal more to do and the Government are committed to doing so. We are taking steps to reduce our reliance on single-use plastics and to explore more sustainable alternatives. These regulations will help us achieve that. I beg to move.

Motion agreed.