Say NO to plastic bags

gromituk

Consumers in certain supermarkets abroad (Germany?) have been known to remove all unnecessary packaging at the checkout and leave it there.

I'm afraid it's marketing. For something as insubstantial and impulsive as an Easter egg, surrounding it with glittery packaging will make it sell. That is why legislation is required to outlaw these things, thus making a level playing field.

Wig

gromituk wrote:

Consumers in certain supermarkets abroad (Germany?) have been known to remove all unnecessary packaging at the checkout and leave it there.

There will come a day when we all have our wheelie bins weighed by the bin lorry and we will be charged for our waste. Maybe that will be the time when loads of consumers remove the excess packaging at the tills, and let the supermarket pay for the waste removal.

rlm_3

Wig wrote:

There will come a day when we all have our wheelie bins weighed by the bin lorry and we will be charged for our waste. Maybe that will be the time when loads of consumers remove the excess packaging at the tills, and let the supermarket pay for the waste removal.

Well funnily enough, after reading this thread I had a conversation with my Irish friend about plastic bags in Ireland. We then moved on to talk about recycling in general and she said that back home they have special trucks that weigh the amount of rubbish in your wheelie been and you get charged for refuse collection by how much you put in your bin for non-recylcable refuse. It seems that day has already dawned in Ireland.

Not sure what impact this had on the packaging that goods come in though. Will have to ask my friend...

gromituk

I just looked at the Tesco website, and instead of finding out about plastic bags, I ended up complaining to them about black text on a dark blue background, and then complaining about their feedback page not working properly with Firefox!

Just_Looking_3

When I shop at Harrods I don't want to be putting my purchases in a Tesco's bag. I firmly believe in free plastic bags everywhere you shop, I've seen women with a large family and a small income forking out as much as 50 pence for bags, admittedly it would be wise to keep the bags safe for re-use but it does not always work that way, the manufacture of carrier bags keeps somebody in employment, probably some ethnic minority refugee who is glad of the job and sends money back to his home country so his family can have a meal every other day, I say keep the free plastic bags.

pdpped

So what have we learnt from this ? If the shop assistants try to force a bag on you tell them they are distroying the planet. Everyone around will scowl at them. Does any one have anymore uses for bags other than bin bags ?

Fleur_2

DO_YOU_KNOW_DAVE wrote:

Also ,I don't know if I read it here or somewhere else but the Womens Institute in Germany organised all there members to shop on the same day and leave all the unnecessary packaging behind after paying.

What an excellent idea.
I used to work in a HUGE sainsburys when we were saving for our first house. I had regular customers who would seek me out on the tills cos I let them leave behind unwanted packagaing.
One chap used to take all packaging off items, tear out cooking instructions and leave the rest at the till. Suited me fine, I just popped it in the bin and never got yelled at once for allowing him to do it.
I also used to let people through with the manky tail ends from the green veg area for their bunnies etc. I always figured that they would only get binned, might as well a small bunnies evening by allowing the owner to take it away.

I guess the more people do this, the sooner the larger companies will realise that, actually, we don't want or need all the additional packaging that comes with our food.
It's something which really annoys me.

gromituk

Just_Looking wrote:

I firmly believe in free plastic bags everywhere you shop, I've seen women with a large family and a small income forking out as much as 50 pence for bags, admittedly it would be wise to keep the bags safe for re-use but it does not always work that way

You really haven't thought this through at all. With "free" bags, your large family on its small income simply pays for the bags by paying more for the goods. With paid-for bags, the times when it does work out that they can re-use the bags (and that will be virtually always if money really is that tight), they save money, because the food is cheaper in the first place, tax on bags or no tax.

the manufacture of carrier bags keeps somebody in employment

And so does the pushing of drugs, but you wouldn't want to justify pushing of drugs on those grounds, would you?

Gray0103

Wig wrote:

There will come a day when we all have our wheelie bins weighed by the bin lorry and we will be charged for our waste. Maybe that will be the time when loads of consumers remove the excess packaging at the tills, and let the supermarket pay for the waste removal.

The technology is already in place for this, but it would be for non recyclable material only.
I wouldn't mind this move, as long as the cost was offset against what I have recycled via the council collections.

Watch out for the number of bonfires if this was to pass, when we all had coal fires hardly anything went in the bin (except the cool ashes, metal & food stuffs)

metherer

Gray0103 wrote:

Watch out for the number of bonfires if this was to pass, when we all had coal fires hardly anything went in the bin (except the cool ashes, metal & food stuffs)

Fantastic! The ashes could be used on the garden sometimes, the metal can now be recycled, and the vegetable foodstuffs can be composted. Gues that only leaves meat foodstuffs, which my cat is more than happy to polish off!!

On the bag issue, i agree with the 10p charge, and love the cotton/jute bags. I have a rather funky one from paperchase with utterflies on, which is currently being used as my handbag!

Why can't they introduce it for a trial period of 2 months, and see what happens??

Metherer
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