Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if her Department will consider the potential merits of more closely linking the Extended Producer Responsibility system to business profitability instead of packaging volume.

The Government has no plans to link Extended Producer Responsibility for packaging (pEPR) fees to business profitability. Turnover and packaging weight together determine whether a business has pEPR responsibilities, with a de-minimis threshold to reduce the burden on smaller businesses.

pEPR is based on the principle that producers meet the cost of managing the household packaging they place on the UK market when it becomes waste, creating a direct incentive to reduce unnecessary packaging and use packaging that is easier to recycle. Business profitability does not reflect the amount, type, or recyclability of the packaging supplied, or the costs that the packaging creates for local authority waste management services.