Industry criticises ‘Break the Bag Habit’ campaign
The Packaging & Films Association (PAFA) and Carrier Bags Consortium have written a letter to MPs registering their ‘surprise and concern’ over the ‘Break the Bag Habit’ campaign.
Launched by Keep Britain Tidy, Marine Conservation Society, Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) and Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE), the campaign calls on government to introduce a levy on single-use plastic bags, a move which Barry Turner, CEO of the Packaging & Films Association and Paul Marmot, Chairman of the Carrier Bag Consortium, claim has no ‘scientific justification’ and is ‘in direct contradiction of the findings of the UK Environment Agency (science report SC030148)’.
‘Facts’ about plastic bags
According to Turner and Marmot, the Environment Agency’s report ‘clearly demonstrates that alternatives to the lightweight plastic bag require far more of the earth’s precious resources to produce and have far higher impacts across a life cycle’, and thus proves that the ‘Break the Bag Habit’ campaign shows ‘a blatant misrepresentation of the facts’.
Supplemented with a ‘Fast Facts sheet about Plastic Bags’ leaflet, the letter goes on to call the campaign ‘nothing more than a cynical move which uses greenwash and misinformation in an attempt to replace [the campaigners’] significant fall in government financial support and public donations by supporting a potential tax which may effectively generate funds for their own use’.
Calling on MPs to withhold support from the campaign, Turner and Marmot also ask that they ‘stand by the voluntary agreement which government signed jointly with the retail sector and our industry’ to reduce the carbon impacts of plastic carrier bags and call for more focus on reuse, and encouraging consumers to recycle old bags when they reach their end of life.
‘Of course litter should be [a priority]… but why is Keep Britain Tidy targeting carrier bags when surveys show they represent just 0.03 per cent of littered items in our environment’ ask Turner and Marmot.
‘By repeating myths and misinformation about the significance of plastic carrier bags in the environment, this campaign not only diverts attention from important environmental issues but also encourage[s] a switch to heavier, higher impact alternatives which will not be recycled and are more likely to add more waste to landfill.’
Damn lies
Ben Stafford, Head of Campaigns at the CPRE, responded to the letter, telling Resource: "It's perhaps not the greatest surprise that groups with names like the Packaging and Films Association and the Carrier Bag Consortium don't want to see a levy on single-use bags; turkeys don't usually vote for Christmas.
“But their rather desperate efforts to defend the plastic bag run against the grain of what is happening across the British Isles… CPRE's main interest in this debate is reducing the amount of litter that degrades our countryside. On this point, the statements of these groups remind us that there are lies, damn lies and statistics.
“Plastic bags may constitute a relatively small percentage of the total number of littered items (after all, around 95 per cent of these items are cigarette and chewing gum litter), but anyone who has walked or driven through the countryside and seen them festooning hedges, trees and verges knows that they are one of the most visible, permanent and unsightly kinds of litter. And voluntary measures to slash their use are not working.
"The government must give the special pleading of self-interested groups short shrift, and get on with implementing a levy on single-use plastic bags that will put England back at the forefront of action on litter.”
