Unsustainable Packaging

Robert Goodwill Excerpts

Monday 24th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr Robert Goodwill)]

I thank the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner)—he represents a city that leads the world in many ways, including cycling—for securing this debate, as it comes at a time of significant public interest in plastics and concern about their environmental impact. Plastics used in food packaging, which generates a considerable amount of waste plastics, are a great concern. The number of signatories to the e-petition—almost 250,000—is testament to the public’s concern, and I welcome a debate on the issue, not least because I was involved with it as a former member of the Environmental Audit Committee. Having heard the contributions of Members across the Chamber, I think we are all pretty much on the same page, and I hope I am paying the hon. Gentleman a compliment when I say that I could happily have read out his speech.

The Government share the public’s concerns about the environmental issues surrounding plastics and have set out ambitious plans to address the problem. When plastic use cannot be prevented or plastics cannot be reused, they should be recycled wherever possible. However, managing plastic waste that cannot be reused or recycled is complex and depends on a number of factors, including the type of plastic, the overall environmental impacts of landfill and the efficiency of energy-from-waste facilities. As we have heard, it is not just Government-led initiatives that can push this agenda, but consumer-driven progress in places such as Sheffield and Cambridge. Indeed, in the meal I ate last night, the spinach and the strawberries were picked in the garden without any need for packaging; the potatoes were in a 25 kg paper sack from a farm less than 10 miles away, not using any plastic; and the beef was produced on the estate where we live.

Bans or restrictions on international export markets for waste, such as China’s bans on typical types of paper waste and plastic, present us with a longer-term opportunity to focus on the quality of recyclate we provide and ensure there are end markets for it. The Government have therefore set out ambitious plans to address the problem of plastics. A key commitment in our 25-year environment plan is to eliminate all avoidable plastic waste within 25 years, and we want to move faster for the most problematic plastics. In our resources and waste strategy for England, published last December, we committed to work towards all plastic packaging on the UK market being recyclable, reusable or compostable by 2025.

I stress that we currently have no plans to ban the use of food packaging that cannot be recycled. Most food packaging is technically recyclable, although as we have heard, the current market does not make all recycling economically viable. Our general approach is to help people and companies make the right choice and develop alternatives, rather than ban items outright. There are circumstances in which a ban is appropriate as part of a wider strategic approach: we have already banned the inclusion of plastic microbeads, and Members might be aware that we will be banning the supply of plastic drinking straws, stirrers and plastic-stemmed cotton buds in England from April 2020.

The European Commission recently published its single use plastics directive, which includes a ban on cups, food and beverage containers in takeaway packaging made of expanded polystyrene, and—as my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) pointed out—all products made of oxo-degradable plastic. We will, of course, consider that requirement in the context of our work on eliminating unnecessary plastic waste. However, in the case of food packaging, we are of the view that alternative measures would provide strong incentives for businesses to move away from using packaging that is unrecyclable or environmentally damaging and towards more sustainable packaging. We therefore made a commitment in our resources and waste strategy to reform the current producer responsibility system as an immediate priority, in order to incentivise producers financially to take greater responsibility for the environmental impacts of their products.

Our priority is to prevent or reduce waste in the first place. The system already requires businesses to ensure that all their packaging does not exceed what is needed to make sure that their products are safe, hygienic and acceptable for both the packed product and the consumer. The regulations apply to those responsible for the packing or filling of products into packaging and those importing packed or filled packaging into the UK from elsewhere. This is a market-based system that has succeeded in ensuring that the UK has met its wider packaging recycling targets at the lowest cost to producers. The UK reported to Eurostat that 64.27% of UK packaging waste was recycled in 2018, surpassing the 55% recycling target set in the European directive.

The current system does not, however, sufficiently incentivise design for greater reuse or recyclability, and less than a tenth of the cost of managing household packaging waste is covered by producers. In February, we published a consultation setting out our proposals to reform the system. That was one of several Government consultations published on overhauling the waste system, including a consultation on introducing a deposit return scheme for drinks containers and increasing consistency in recycling collections—in that regard, we look forward to drawing lessons from the Scottish experience.

We also consulted on introducing a tax on plastic packaging containing less than 30% recycled content. The proposal is for that tax to apply to all plastic packaging manufactured in the UK and to plastic packaging imported into the UK with less than 30% recycled content. It will be charged on plastic packaging that manufacturers place on the market, and the consultation sought views on the precise tax point. Imported unfilled plastic packaging—packaging that does not yet contain goods—will be taxed when it is released on to the UK market, and unfilled plastic packaging that is exported would not be chargeable. The tax will be charged at a flat rate per tonne of packaging material. We plan to introduce that tax in 2022; in its consultation, the Treasury asked whether it should be at a flat rate of 30% or should vary for different purchasing formats, and whether the threshold should increase over time.

The proposals for reforming the packaging producer responsibility regime tie together the broader set of principles for extended producer responsibility included in our resources and waste strategy and our ambitions for the packaging sector in future. Those include the reduction of unnecessary packaging, the reduction or elimination of materials that are difficult to recycle—for example, composite products such as coffee cups, made of cardboard material with plastic applied to it—and the increased recycling of packaging waste. A key proposal is that producers fund the net cost of managing the packaging that they place on the market once it becomes waste. That creates an incentive for companies to use less packaging, as that will reduce the cost of complying with the regulations. A further proposal includes adopting approaches to incentivise producers to adopt recyclable packaging along the way.

In conclusion, I stress that the Government see the elimination of avoidable plastic waste as a priority, and we look forward to introducing further measures to make this country greener still. We are already the greenest Government ever, and we plan to build on that. I will allow a little bit of time for the hon. Member for Cambridge to respond.