Plastic bag tax

SnowyOwl_2

I used to work in Sainsbury's in Newry and can say that I was astonished at the sheer volume of bags which were delivered to the store on a weekly basis. Just seeing a week's worth of "free" bags all piled up brought it home to me how much goes into the manufacture and transport of these items (from England so by road then boat then road), just for most of them to be used once and then binned. That more than anything prompted me to obtain and use some heavy duty shopping bags - I've been using those for a couple of years now, so at a rough guestimate I've avoided picking up 520 disposable bags.

It makes me cringe to see disposable bags chucked on the ground in the car park of the store the bag came from. What was the point in having a bag in the first place? That is totally pointless waste. The sight of plastic bags blowing about or caught in hedges/trees is a sad reflection on the throw away society we live in.

IMO the 5p charge/tax on bags is a very positive thing, and will certainly help change bad expensive habits.

A.L.D.A

SnowyOwl wrote: »

IMO the 5p charge/tax on bags is a very positive thing, and will certainly help change bad expensive habits.

I agree, the free bag culture is an utter pestilence. Collectively we use tons of them. They are not needed and cost our economy to produce and transport. They end up in all sorts of undesirable places and cost more money to clear up.

It is easy to avoid the charge by bringing stronger bags with you and on the few occasions that you don't paying a few pence isn't going to make much difference.

( Wonder how Chinese and Indian Carry Outs will manage?)

mildred1978

A.L.D.A wrote: »

I agree, the free bag culture is an utter pestilence. Collectively we use tons of them. They are not needed and cost our economy to produce and transport. They end up in all sorts of undesirable places and cost more money to clear up.

It is easy to avoid the charge by bringing stronger bags with you and on the few occasions that you don't paying a few pence isn't going to make much difference.

( Wonder how Chinese and Indian Carry Outs will manage?)

You buy bags or take your own. My local chippy doesn't offer bags at all now so that they don't have to manage all the 5p stuff.

Ben84

Mistral001 wrote: »

How cool is that? I have Harrod's bags myself. It really impresses the neighbours when I take the shopping out of the car.

Be careful, one day the handle might fall off sending red and blue striped cans rolling down the street!

leftieM

My pet plastic bag hating moment comes at the glass recycling points. People take the trouble to recycle their bottles rather than chuck them in the bin - and then leave the bags they had the bottle in on the road, or stuff them down the side of the bottle bank, or (the best) stuff them through the loop at the top of the bank. What are they thinking????

leftieM

A.L.D.A wrote: »

( Wonder how Chinese and Indian Carry Outs will manage?)

They'll use paper bags I assume?
An earlier poster said that we'll be charged for paper bags but it's only plastic bags according to the Beeb.

blueberrypie

leftieM wrote: »

They'll use paper bags I assume?
An earlier poster said that we'll be charged for paper bags but it's only plastic bags according to the Beeb.

If you click through from the BBC story to the rethinkwasteni.org website, you'll see this:

As paper bags and other alternatives to plastic bags can be equally damaging to the environment, it is proposed that from 1 April 2013 the carrier bag levy will apply to all single use carrier bags – not just plastic bags.

http://www.rethinkwasteni.org/at-home/reduce/carrierbaglevy/