Compostable bags ‘con’

PLASTIC bags and packaging labelled “compostable” can’t really go in your home compost bin, a minister has admitted.

It follows a study which found that 60% of items marketed as “home compostable” failed to break down in the real world, in garden composters and food waste bins.

Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs minister Lord Benyon said: “These plastics must be treated in industrial composting facilities to be broken down and when processed incorrectly can be a source of microplastics and contaminate recycling streams.”

Green Party peer Natalie Bennett called compostable plastic claims a con.

She said that millions of people would be “surprised” to learn they can’t compost most compostable branded plastic.

The Government wants all plastic packaging sold in the UK to be “recyclable, reusable or compostable by 2025”.

Baroness Bennett added that the current confusion is “just one more area of Tory policy chaos”.