Plastic straw ban by top pub chain

POPULAR pub chain Wetherspoon’s is introducing a ban on plastic straws as a new campaign to cut pollution gathers pace.

The decision by the company, which has 900 pubs across the UK including The Baron in Hinckley, will prevent around 70 million single-use plastic straws being discarded each year.

According to scientists the straws take up to 500 years to rot if they are dumped in landfill along with other waste.

Some 100 million straws are used in the UK every day. Most are made from polypropylene, derived from crude oil.

They are one of the top 10 items found littering beaches and can end up lodged in the nostrils of sea turtles and can perforate the stomachs of penguins.

Wetherspoon’s will replace the plastic straws with biodegradable paper ones from the beginning of next year. In the meantime staff will not automatically put plastic straws into drinks unless the customer requests one.

Fellow pub chain All Bar One, part of the Mitchells and Butlers group, has already stopped using plastic straws.

It now uses straws from Edinburgh company Vegware which are made from plant-based materials that rots easily.

Vegware has also developed a range of compostable green cups and packaging that can replace plastic - a potential solution for big-name coffee shop companies, under pressure replace the current throw-away cups which have a thin plastic layer making them difficult to recycle.

Action on plastic pollution has been gaining momentum in recent years. The introduction of the 5p ‘bag tax’ has dra- matically cut plastic bag usage for supermarkets and other retailers, while cotton buds are increasingly being made without plastic sticks.

Despite warnings on packing telling consumers not to dispose of them down the toilet, millions end up in the sewage system and the sea and wash up on beaches.

Facial cleansers with plastic microbeads are also being targeted with the Government announcing a ban on their inclusion in products.

Studies at Exeter Uni- versity have found the entire food chain of sea creatures from minuscule zooplankton through to crustaceans or copepods, mussels, crabs, lobster and fish have effectively become contaminated by microplastics.