50 signatures reached
To: George Eustice - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Covid-19: Prohibit supermarkets from using Plastic Bags in delivery and collection services
Prevent supermarkets from using plastic bags for the purposes of grocery deliveries or in collection services. They should not use them at all, encouraging customers to take their own reusable bags, or replace them with environmentally friendly alternatives.
Why is this important?
Since the first UK lockdown, competition laws were relaxed by the government, waiving the 5p bag fee for online deliveries and collection. That has led to supermarkets using hundreds of thousands of plastic bags against the wishes of consumers.
Over several decades leading up to 2020, the UK has worked to reduce waste from single-use disposable objects such as straws, utensils, coffee cups, beverage bottles and plastic bags. Possibly the most encouraging shift we witnessed, was the change in social norms around plastic waste; habitually taking our reusable bags to the supermarkets. Through the recent rule changes, all of the good work we were doing, collectively, as a nation, will have been for nothing; the good habits we got into, will be undone.
We are at a pivotal moment in terms of plastic pollution. With the mounting piles of used single-use face masks, gloves and other protective equipment, we need to prevent Covid-19 actually becoming a pandemic of plastic pollution, and the government can help by eliminating unnecessary plastic bags.
