Will paying for plastic bags make us greener?

It definitely changed things in Ireland when they introduced it in 2002. Here is an article from the BBC at that time saying that it had created a 90% drop in plastic bag usage. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2205419.stm Mind you, they were then charging 15c per bag, a lot more than the proposed cost in Wales now. It’s gone up to 22c per bag now, which is a major deterrent to using them and I have noticed that the bags you do end up buying sometimes (I, for one, often walk out of the house without my shopping bags), are flimsy and break easily. It has raised millions of Euros in Ireland and cut down on the number of plastic bags that were often seen flying about as litter. All in all, I think it’s a great thing to have introduced this. I don’t know why the UK has taken so long to get there. Think of the revenue and the help to the environment.

Like mhanley I wonder if just 5p is going to be that big a deterrent. Maybe 20p would be better. It would have set you back £2, Hannah! I also sometimes forget to take my shopping bags with me and end up using new bags and I feel guilty about it too. If I were charged 20p a pop I’d be surer to remember to take my shopping bags with me wherever I went!

I totally agree that Wales has the right idea. The scheme does need all retailers on board to really get into people’s mindsets and work properly and it should be really rolled out throughout the UK.

Re Marks and Spencer charging for bags; if you food shop, they charge 5p per bag to carry home products which themselves are packaged in oversized, non recyclable containers, yet buy something in any other department and a bag is given automatically.

I am in favour of all taxation that is avoidable [like betting, smoking and other pleasures] so I have no problem with a tax on plastic bags but it must apply to all purchases, not just essential food shopping which would bear more heavily on those on lower incomes. Everyone forgets to take their reusable bags out from time to time and we have a cupboard full of bags for life bought on such occasions, so the imposition of a penalty for taking plastic bags might discipline us into compliance. But while I agree with a previous comment about excess packaging in M&S, unfortunately some shops are so cheese-paring with their packaging that bags are essential for product protection and separation. [Why is the best butter wrapped in a piece of greaseproof paper that gets torn while the “not-really-quite-as-nice-as-butter” spreads all come in sharp-edged plastic tubs that puncture the yogurt pot lids?] Aldi shops won’t wait while you carefully put your stuff away into your separate bags for each commodity – it all comes wooshing off the belt into your box or trolley in no particular order with the washing powder on top of the ice cream on most occasions. Waitrose only release their own bags under protest, interrogate you on how many bags you’ve brought with you, whether they are standard size or extra large, and – if you’ve been sufficiently worthy – give you little green Ludo counters to put in one of three drums to support your choice of local charity. But never go to Tescos without your own bags because their ordinary plastic bags are so small, thin and useless that they split or break before you even get home. Morrisons plastic bags are the best for size and strength and can be reused many times over. Sainsburys used to provide large strong paper bags that would last ever so long [I still have two that must be over twenty years old] so why cannot the supermarkets and all other retailers do the same today [as Primark do]?

Totally, totally agree with this, many EU countries have adopted this, the UK, as per norm in the eco-awareness stakes lags far behind her neighbours. Retailers will more than re-coup the price of bags where they have to be issued and, more importantly, fewer bags,taking an eon to bio-degrade, if at all, end up in landfill. In reality it shouldn’t cost us anything other than a change in attitude – we remember to take the strong canvas/hessian bags (or keep them in the car) as much as we remember to take my wallet (please note it’s always MY wallet :)). It’s a no brainer. No excuse. Do not pass Go until you re-use your bags. Simple as. End of.

Do away with all plastic bags Costco don’t supply bags of any description although they might have the occasional cardboard box which is re-cyclable.I come from a time when there was no such thing as a plastic bag. Ban the plastic!!!!

A thought — what is the environmental cost of minting all these extra 5p pieces? Probably more than creating the plastic…….Perhaps the Royal mint, being in South Wales has an input here?
As for thinking of the revenue, what revenue? As far as I can see it willl be extra profit for the supermarkets, I agree with wbdoyle — don’t supply any bags at all.

I fully agree with Peter Robson. This campaign (backed by retailers) is just a way for supermarkets (in particular) to increase revenue. Would bin liners which I had bought be any better for the environment than free carrier bags?
Furthermore, if they really were bothered about the environment, they would give away degradable bags (like the Co-op do) which at least goes part way to solving the problem.

Do people realise the 5p charge will be on all single use carrier bags, including PAPER. Also clothes retailers will have to charge as well. I dont believe all the traders wanted this as they will have to record each sale, take expenses out, and donate the rest to charity. It will be a lot of hassle and they will be fined if they do not charge customers.

Why should we pay for bags that advertise the supermarket that we are shopping in? If when I forget my bags and have to use a supermarket bag I won’t quibble if they have their logo on the side and the bag is free. If I have to pay for my bag then I should get a choice of design on the bag and it should be able to hold my shopping and not fall apart.

The issue at hand is reducing the number of bags, paper or plastic, that we manufacture in the first place, re-using them when we can, and recycling them when they come to the end of their lives. The issue is not whether supermarkets and others are making yet another bit of profit, whether we give them free advertising, or the premise that just because we’ve made a purchase we should have a choice and the product should last a year.

We can reduce the number of bags being manufactured by taking shopping bags wherever we go. The problem of leaving or entering shops with unbagged items then becomes non-existent. If purchasing items such as clothes, it isn’t difficult to use a nice shopping bag dedicated solely for that purpose. If we worry about our image, street cred or what not, let’s get ourselves a few funky shopping bags, they do exist. And there will come a time when shopping elsewhere because you’re not given a bag for free will not be much of an option, because you will have to pay for it just about everywhere. Just look at how more and more retailers are latching to on to this idea. And what’s wrong with using another dedicated shopping bag to do our recycling?

If we do manage to get hold of plastic bags at the supermarket or elsewhere, let’s make darn sure at the very least that we re-use them, to line our bins at home, or to shop again with, do our recycling or whatever. Then let’s darn make sure that we recycle the plastic bags once they have reached the end of their lives. Forget about plastic bags being biodegradable, the scientific fact is that they aren’t.

Regarding using bin liners instead of using supermarket plastic bags, it is unfortunately the case that too few of us reuse our plastic bags. Too many of us chuck them out in the bin without even beginning to think about recycling them, and then use bin liners! If supermarket bags are expensive to buy or disappear altogether, the amount of plastic manufactured and wasted will be reduced.

so-called biodegradeable bags do not rot down in composters. My last batch of compost was spoilt by the disgusting taks of picking out all the strands on unrotted bags from the lovely brown mixture. I will never use them again

Why have plastic bags anyway? If we are going to have to pay for bags, why can’t we buy brown paper bags, (made from recycled paper) that would not harm the environment and could provide local councils with a regular income from their recycled paper.

It’s interesting to read the comments here and it makes me wonder what the average age of the contributors is or, possibly, whether my experience is less “average” than I thought:

When I first started working in 1986 I worked for Beatties of London (the toy chain) at their Sheffield branch. I was with Beatties for just over 8 years and worked in their stores up and down the country. Beatties carrier bags were listed on the tills and charged at 1p each for all “normal” bags (i.e. they had handles) and 2p each for the “bin liner” size that you used for such as scalextric sets. Now, to be fair, we didn’t always charge – especially at very busy times – and that was wrong because it was unfair, however, I don’t recall any customer complaining when charged for a bag at all.

Prior to leaving my parents home in 1986 I had only ever known the Co-Op for grocery shopping as my parents were fiercely loyal to the Co-Op and would not shop anywhere else. They didn’t have bags, at all. If you wanted to put your shopping in something to take it home you collected an empty cardboard box from the end of the store where they stacked up the boxes that had been emptied to fill the shelves.

All through the 8 years I was working in retail it seemed quite usual for supermarkets to have boxes on offer and most seemed to charge 2 or 5p each for bags – Gateway (later Somerfield, now the Co-Op) was my local and regular shop and they certainly charged 5p each for carriers until quite some time after they became Somerfield.

At both the Co-Op and the shops I used between 1986 and 1994 I don;t recall ever hearing anyone complain about paying for bags, having to bring their own or using boxes.

Was I in a very unusual parallel universe or have other contributors forgotten those times or not lived through them?

My own theory, and it is a guess, is that bags started to be given free with every purchase because it was an easy way to show that the goods had been paid for and with the massive upsurge in shoplifting this became an important point. It would be hard to insist that a customer bought a bag they did not want just to prove that they were not shoplifting, so I’m guessing that might be why bags started being dished out like confetti for no charge?

I absolutely agree with everyone who says that we SHOUDL charge, that we should charge for bags for ALL purchases, and that the charge should be 5p or more. I do, however, think that shops should make available boxes and other eco-friendly and free (because they have already been used for their designated purpose) ways to carry things home and I also think that the old Sainsbury’s idea of 1p off your bill for each bag you bring with you, as an incentive for the more forgetful, are also very sound ideas.

No supermarket in France offers free plastic bags. As here, the ‘bag for life’ is around 5 cents. So you remember to carry these or find ways to get your goods home without paying more. As long as bags are free most will not bother to think about the problem – I’m astounded that the vast majority of Which? respondents think, and even rationalise, that bags should be provided free. Why, when the cost to the environment can be avoided so easily? Paper bags still have to be recycled. I’ve probably had about 3 replacement ‘bags for life’ since they were first introduced maybe ten years ago. We should all pay for plastic bags and if the cost to the environment is more than 5p. then we should pay it. It is perfectly simple to avoid this payment with a little forethought.

I agree with peter robinson. A better solution would be to make the supermarkers etc. provide bio degradeable plastic bags at no extra charge. The shop plastic bags avoid the need to purchase plastic bin liners, even Tescos

I think that the carriers should now all be plain, no logos, no colour coding. I have absolutely no problem paying for a plain one but I’m not paying to advertise. Carrier bags have never been “free”. No business gives anything away. I have always brought my own bags for the weekly shop but do forget when I pop into my local convenience store, so this will spur me on to keep a couple in my handbag.
Just to annoy the snobbier supermarkets though I may bring my budget shop carriers to pack my shopping in.Childish me? Perhaps!

We have already paid for our precious plastic bags and what with you ask? The world of course and all the other animals on this plannet are now going to suffer because of it. we have destroyed the future of this planet and all the over animals whose home it is with our selfish addiction to pollution.

A lot of people nowadays would not remember that we used to have to pay for carrier bags back in the late 1950’s, early 1960’s until a group of us complained that although we paid for the bags we did not have the choice of paying for plain bags – they all had the shops logo on them and we objected to paying the shops for the privilege of advertising for them. The press took it up and the big supermarkets decided that it was better to give them for free than remove the logo. Does the new law give the consumer the right to demand a plain bag? If not, why not?

I think it is not good because peoples recycles them. i leave in London on 17 floor . I wont go down to recycle bins if I don’t have bags to recycle

It is real simple. No1 no bags no bags to manufacture No2 No disposable bags to plastic bag tree’s/lay around and No3 less waste. The whole of Northern Ireland looks loads better since the charge started there