There is a danger of a bottle-deposit scheme becoming just another tax
SIR – Any initiative to boost recycling is to be welcomed, but I wonder if the so-called deposit to be paid on singleuse bottles and cans (report, March 28) may for most households in practice simply be an additional tax.
In my case, these items are always consigned to the blue recycle bin, which achieves exactly the same environmental effect as would a deposit return scheme.
My suspicion is that the ready availability of access to household recycling, along with the hassle of returning these items to source, will result in many people failing to recover the deposits paid.
The tax will be paid by all, but probably reclaimed by relatively few – another a nice little earner for the Treasury. Simon Millar
Poole, Dorset
SIR – Growing up in Norway in the Seventies, I remember being given permission by our parents to take the plastic bottles back to the shop, depositing them in a vending machine in exchange for money we could spend on sweets. That is over 40 years ago. Why has it taken Britain so long to come up with this bright idea? Siw Glanfield
Alresford, Hampshire
SIR – I am as keen as anyone to reduce pollution and littering. However, before we rush into a bottle deposit scheme, I would like to know some facts.
How is plastic getting into the oceans? If it is being dumped after we export our recycling, then the deposit scheme will make little difference.
Secondly, how will this sit with kerbside recycling?
Thirdly, if people save up their bottles and make a special trip in the car to return them, how does that sit in terms of net pollution reduction?
Jenny Furness
Doncaster, South Yorkshire
SIR – Food used to be wrapped in greaseproof paper. Now our butcher and fishmonger believe they are required, by law, to use plastic. Changing or clarifying the law in this respect would be very helpful. Michael Heaton
Warminster, Wiltshire
SIR – Payment for returned bottles takes me back to my childhood in the late Forties. If I was short of a bob or two, I would get my mother’s old carrier bag and visit local parks, where one could find empty glass beer or lemonade bottles lying around. In an hour or two I could find half a crown’s (2s 6d) worth of bottles and redeem them at the off-licence.
Happy days and easy money. Professor M M R Williams Eastbourne, East Sussex
SIR – Yesterday morning I rinsed and placed a milk bottle on my doorstep. No more plastic for me. I love the fact that the milkman still delivers in his electric cart. Chris Leek
Kings Langley, Hertfordshire