Campaign Launched To Introduce 10p Deposit On Plastic Bottles

An environmental charity has started a petition calling on the Govenment to introduce a deposit scheme on plastic bottles, as plastic bottle litter is significantly increasing around our shorelines as 16 million are thrown away every day in the UK. While ministers are considering plans for a plastic bottle charge as part of a crackdown on waste clogging up landfill sites and entering the sea, the soft drinks industry are lobbying to have them dropped. A leaked internal document from Coca Cola reveals the company prioritised a “fight back” against EU moves to introduce deposit return schemes (DRS). The company also spent close to one million euros lobbying the EU commission, and met several times with politicians in Westminster. The DRS system has been shown to raise collection rates in Germany, Sweden and Denmark and is now being considered by other countries including Scotland. In Norway, 96% of plastic drinks bottles are returned by consumers for recycling. Surfers Against Sewage’s 'Message In A Bottle' campaign is petitioning now, stating that single-use plastic bottles are fast becoming synonymous with our beaches, and they can take more than 450 years to fragment into micro plastics, harming marine life on the way. In England, plastic bag usage dropped 85% in six months after the introduction of the 5p charge in October 2015.

The petition can be found HERE. You can find about more about Surfers Against Sewage HERE.