Mrs May’s laudable war on plastic waste
AS the Prime Minister takes personal charge of a crusade against plastic waste, this is a day to celebrate the power of a campaigning free Press to change our world for the better.
At the Mail, we hesitate to blow our own trumpet. But we take pride in our central role, handsomely acknowledged by Theresa May, in transforming the way people behave and think about the wanton pollution of our planet.
When we launched our Banish the Bags campaign, ten years ago next month, it was touch and go how shoppers would react to our proposal that a small charge should be imposed on single-use supermarket plastic bags, used on average for 20 minutes but taking up to 1,000 years to rot away.
In the event, we needn’t have worried. Far from complaining, the public enthusiastically embraced the idea, to the point where it has now become second nature for most to bring their own reusable bags to the supermarket.
Indeed, in the three years since the charge became mandatory, the number of plastic bags issued has plummeted by nine billion. That’s nine billion fewer unnecessary pollutants to endanger wildlife and scar our streets, countryside, rivers and seas.
Following a vigorous Mail campaign, the Scottish Government has committed to introducing a deposit return scheme which would see a 10p charge introduced on bottles and cans, which is then refunded when the containers are returned to shops for recycling.
And, as we reveal today, the sale and manufacture of cotton buds containing plastic is to be banned in Scotland. This comes on the back of a widely supported campaign to force Scots pubs, restaurants and fast-food outlets to stop using plastic straws.
But there is a massive amount of work left to be done if our ecosystem is to be saved from the trillions of indestructible toxic microbeads, superfluous packaging and billions of unrecyled plastic bottles and coffee cups recklessly churned out each year.
It is too soon to predict the effectiveness of Mrs May’s proposals, such as her imaginative scheme to introduce plastic-free supermarket aisles. But her plan to divert foreign aid money to cleaning up the seas can only be welcome, while her ambition to end all avoidable use of plastic by 2040 is hugely encouraging.
As the Mail has always argued, the plastic plague can be beaten, leaving a cleaner, greener planet for our children and grandchildren. All that is needed is common sense and political will. We trust that today, Mrs May will prove she has both.