Plastic bag charge to double to 10p and apply in ALL shops - MSE News

Paul_Herring

I think it's one of those Middle-class guilt narratives that crop up from time-to-time.

It's taking on overtones of some sort of religion, with fervour being expressed in the form:

"I'm greener than thou, because I do..."

"No, I'm greener than thou, because..."

With 'non-believers' being castigated when they suggest that, perhaps, maybe, they're taking things a little too far...

zerog

Instead of throwing away the 5p bags, people now just throw away the 10p bags.

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth

Just remember that the greens and politicians recommended diesel cars for low CO2 emissions! Now we are going to use virgin cellulose from forests to make paper bags and be rid if the reusable plastic one?

hollydays

I have in the past queried why charity shops want to charge for bags when they get loads donated with stock in them which could be recycled.
I’ve twice been told that a charity shop was fined for giving out another companies carrier bag. This seems unlikely , and an urban myth .
here's the link.That disproves it
https://www.pembrokeshire.gov.uk/trading-standards-information/single-use-carrier-bags#tsi1


«!Exemptions
The supply of certain single-use carrier bags are exempt from the minimum charge; see details of these exemptions below.
Furthermore bags made from cloth (jute, cotton and hessian), thick plastic 'bags for life' as described above, or single-use carrier bags that have already been charged for once and are recycled and used again (such as by a charity shop or market stall), are all exempt from the charge.
Single-use carrier bags used solely to contain the following products are exempt from the charge:!«!

Fire_Fox

maisie_cat wrote: »

Personally I think that people should have got the message by now. Make customers buy a biodegradable bag @£1 every time if they are that stupid. We used the waste cardboard boxes decades ago and there is no excuse

Stupid? Or forgetful due to health issues, or the bag they brought with them breaks, or is too small for their purchases.

Decades ago far fewer adults made excuses to run a private pollution machine.

maisie_cat wrote: »

I just sold a car that did 69000 miles in 15 years, hardly swanning about, but the swanning about pollution machine does not kill week old calves or marine life in the same terrifying way

"Air pollution has a significant effect on public health, and poor air quality is the largest environmental risk to public health in the UK ... It is estimated that long-term exposure to man-made air pollution in the UK has an annual effect equivalent to 28,000 to 36,000 deaths.

The three main conditions associated with air pollution are respiratory conditions (such as asthma), cardiovascular disease (CVD), and lung cancer, and there is emerging evidence for associations with dementia, low birth weight and Type 2 diabetes."Source

Your 69,000 miles will have harmed children, livestock and wildlife, not just adults like me who live and/ or work in a polluted city centre.

DigForVictory

I have a bag for life collection which I'm using as the source material for a graphic design qualification. (When it is all done, the bags will be given to a local charity shop along with a printout of the trading standards info.The over 7 years old ones may be ebayed as some of the designs are now 'collectable' - go figure.)

I've noticed the thickness/weight of the bags for life has decreased over time despite them beginning to be tagged as capable of carrying so many kilos or reused so many times. I wryly look forward to the day when the bag for life has the same thickness of plastic as the single use bags were.

As I find folding bags for life restful & therapeutic, I tend to have a lot in various locations - coats, car, around the house & thus can offer a bag to almost anyone who needs one. These minor acts of kindness solve short term problems but the argument that we should be charging a great deal more for them til people get into the habit of carrying them is not wholly unreasonable.

My grandmother's string bag is still in use & appreciated a decade after her death & it served her for decades in life. I don't think the offspring are going to feel that way about any of my bags for life!

Maverock

The Government don't give a damn for the environment, if they did they would ban the manufacturing of plastic bags. But the plastic bag manufactures have no doubt lobbied the Government along with the supermarkets to punish the end user.


IT IS NOT our fault!


If our Government had a spine, which, quite plainly they don't, they would ban plastic bags all together and GO BACK to re-cycled paper bags.


But I'm not holding my breath!

Paul_Herring

ban plastic bags all together and GO BACK to re-cycled paper bags.

Considering paper bags are worse for the environment than (at least biodegradable) plastic bags, I don't quite see how that's going to work out...

https://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/weekinreview/01basics.html

But the production of paper bags generates significantly more air and water pollution; manufacturing and recycling them requires more energy than their plastic cousins do, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Paper bags also take up comparatively more space in landfills, where they are slow to degrade, like most everything in a landfill.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/shortcuts/2011/dec/20/paper-plastic-bags-which-best

Wrap, the government-funded company set up to reduce waste, summarises the drawbacks of paper bags: while from a renewable source and biodegradable, compostable and recyclable, they require far more energy to make and transport than plastic, have less re-use potential and produce methane if dumped in landfill.