Question

To ask the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington, representing the House of Commons Commission, what plans the Commission has to increase the level of (a) recycling and (b) reuse to reduce the use of single-use plastic.

On increasing recycling and re-use, Parliament’s Environment Team works in close partnership with its waste contractor to respond to new and emerging opportunities to recycle and recover waste. The waste contract includes a requirement for driving continuous improvements in Parliament’s recycling performance.

Parliament achieved a recycling rate of 59% in 2018–19, with a long-term target to recycle 75% of waste (by weight) by 2020–21.

On reducing single-use avoidable plastics, in May 2018 Parliament announced a comprehensive range of initiatives to drastically reduce its consumption of single-use avoidable plastics:

• Eliminate plastic bottled water
• Eliminate condiment sachets (through substitution)
• Eliminate plastic-lined hot drinks cups, alongside introduction of a ‘latte levy’
• Sell and incentivise the use of re-usable ‘keep cups’
• Substitute disposable catering take-away items with compostable alternatives, alongside the introduction of a compostable waste stream
• Substitute plastic tumblers with compostable alternatives
• Substitute plastic carrier bags with paper ones
• Implement a ‘green stationery’ catalogue
• Pilot a re-usable delivery container scheme at the Offsite Consolidation Centre
• Produce procedures for incorporating the environmental impact of packaging waste into the weighting of relevant procurement exercises

Except for the delivery container pilot scheme, for which a feasibility study has been completed, all single-use plastic initiatives have been fully implemented.