Official Report 291KB pdf
Item 2 is the main item on our agenda. Today is the third of our five planned evidence sessions at stage 1 of the Environmental Levy on Plastic Bags (Scotland) Bill. The member's bill was introduced by Mike Pringle MSP. Our role is to scrutinise the provisions and to report to the Parliament, recommending whether the general principles of the bill should be agreed to.
There seems to be remarkable unanimity in the quartet before us on the approach to Mike Pringle's bill. As you know, the bill set out three objectives: to protect the environment; to assist local authorities towards meeting waste-plan targets; and to raise awareness. I think that you all claim that it will do none of those things and that, rather, it could have adverse impacts. Will you give us your reasons for taking that line?
Our conclusion is based on independent studies, and on a consideration of the experience in Ireland of what happens when one product is taxed and a uniform approach to all products that might be used for a particular application is not adopted. We have drawn on studies that have been done in Ireland and elsewhere around the world and have concluded that, after such legislation is passed, there is an increase in waste going to landfill, which is something that we all seek to avoid. I can cite where the evidence comes from. We submitted it as part of our evidence, but if members want to ask questions about particular elements of it, we will be more than willing to answer them.
The response to that might be that you would say that because of the line of business that you are in.
I would beg to differ. The CBC represents members who supply all sorts of products to the industry. The evidence that has been submitted by our members, which include people such as Neil Young, who supplies a variety of products that are in question in this discussion, provides a balanced view; it is not just drawn from information from manufacturers of polythene products. I ask Neil Young to expand on that.
My company manufactures paper products. We manufacture paper sacks and have more than 60 per cent of the paper potato sacks market in the United Kingdom; we are based at a site in Hull and a site in Glasgow. Every year, we sell about 12,000 or 13,000 tonnes of paper products and about 15,000 tonnes of polythene products, from carrier bags to industrial, medical and agricultural products.
What you are saying is becoming an open statement, partly because Ted Brocklebank asked an open-ended question, which he knew when he asked it. I was being slightly lenient.
I will let somebody else in.
We will get another couple of responses from the witnesses. Almost all the members of the committee will then want to come back on what has been said.
Mackinnon and Hay Ltd is a very small company that has been on the go for a long time. I have brought with me a few examples of the low-density carrier bags that we make for a hairdresser, for chartered accountants and for glazing companies. None of those businesses will register for the levy. We have already lost a customer because of speculation about the bill.
I will keep my comments brief and to the point. We are the largest manufacturer of polythene products in Europe. We have grown that business from a Scottish base and we are headquartered in Scotland. Our total sales are about 335,000 tonnes, of which less than 0.5 per cent is carrier bags. Therefore, I do not have a vested interested in the manufacture of carrier bags. If anything, I would tend to benefit if the legislation goes ahead as there would be greater sales of bin-liners, refuse sacks and so on.
I will not give Ted Brocklebank a supplementary because his first question was far too long.
I have a question for Barry Turner. Evidence that has been presented to the committee shows that the number of jobs in the carrier bag industry has gone down since the 1980s. What are the main reasons for that decline?
Does your question relate specifically to Scotland, Europe or the United Kingdom?
To Scotland and the UK.
The number of manufacturing jobs has reduced because some products are now imported owing to the advantages of importing lower-cost products from certain places in the world. I suggest that reductions have also come about because some retailers have taken measures to implement a voluntary code by challenging people when they make a one-off purchase of goods and asking them, "Do you need a bag?" That question did not used to be asked when someone went into a retail outlet, but it is asked an awful lot more these days. Those are some of the reasons why the number of jobs in the industry has reduced.
It is interesting that you say that many plastic bags are now imported. What proportion of the plastic bags that are distributed in supermarkets are imported?
A large proportion of the bags in supermarkets are imported. Some of the suppliers who are sitting at the table today—and others who are not—continue to supply supermarkets and a significant number of small and medium-sized retailers in Scotland.
That is an interesting point. Evidence from yourselves and other organisations suggests that there would be between 300 and 700 job losses as a result of the bill. Can you break that down? How many jobs would be lost in manufacture and how many would be lost in the distribution of plastic bags?
We could break the figures down, but first I point out that we did not provide those figures; they were sought independently by AEA in compiling the study. However, having studied them, we concur that about that number of jobs would be affected. AEA is correct about the number of jobs that would be affected and between 20 and 30 companies that supply plastic bags in Scotland would be affected by the legislation.
What percentage of jobs is in manufacturing plastic bags and what percentage is in distribution?
I will turn to my colleagues for that information. I imagine that about a third of jobs are in manufacture.
That is roughly accurate, although it is hard to say, as I do not have exact figures.
We can provide the relevant information if you wish.
There are figures on the possible effect on the industry in the extended impact assessment that we got from the Scottish Executive. The assessment mentions BPI's Greenock plant, the Simpac plant in Glasgow and other smaller manufacturers. There is information in the assessment that colleagues might like to explore in more depth. We could also get information from Barry Turner and his colleagues.
That is useful.
I am not quite sure why you want the percentage split: a job is a job, no matter what it is doing. I do not understand where this is going.
I ask about distribution versus manufacture because there are distribution opportunities in the bill. For example, there will be distribution opportunities if more people start using bags for life or start buying paper bags.
Distributing a thicker, heavier, less environmentally friendly product would not result in more distribution jobs. There will be fewer bags, although there will be more volume and more weight. That is the issue, and that is why there will be more recovery to do and more landfill to consider. I accept that some distributors might be able to switch business, but we cannot assume that distributors will be able to employ exactly the same number of people once the bill has come into force. That will not be the case, because the number of plastic bags being distributed will decrease dramatically.
Thank you. I might let you ask more questions later, Mark, but other colleagues are waiting.
The four witnesses have robustly defended their industry and those employed in it. Neil Young said that the proposed legislation was bad legislation and of no benefit to the environment. How should Scotland proceed? How should we sort things out?
My view on this is quite simple: many countries have instigated codes of conduct and our industry would actively support such a code here. Voluntary reduction is far better for the country than forcing people to pay tax for something that they need. Success in Australia has been well documented: over two years, the number of carrier bags in circulation has been reduced by 25 per cent. We actively encourage people to put the message on their carrier bags that the bag is renewable and recyclable.
The other question concerns how we should proceed. If we are serious about tackling the amount of waste that the country generates for landfill, should we start by tackling something that accounts for 0.3 per cent of landfill? Indeed, should we introduce legislation that will increase that 0.3 per cent? Surely not; surely we should concentrate on the products that contribute a large volume of waste to landfill. If we have to focus on something, we should focus on those products and we should do so through consultation and discussion with retailers and the industry. That will allow us to tackle the problem properly.
The solution lies in education not legislation. I attended the Environment and Rural Development's first meeting on the issue. At that meeting, the chief executive of Friends of the Earth Scotland gave evidence. I agreed with one thing that he said which was that when he was asked whether he would start from here, he said no. Many other issues are more significant than the one we are discussing today.
I am not closing my mind to what we may hear from other witnesses, but what I have heard today is compelling.
We have heard that the voluntary approach in Australia has not worked and that there are now moves towards having a more statutory arrangement. We are dealing with the problem of the big four supermarkets using large amounts of polythene. At the heart of the bill is an attempt to change people's behaviour. You are in the business of producing polythene, not changing people's behaviour, but we have to take on board the need to attempt to change that behaviour. How can you help to do that, given the evidence that we need to make a change in this area and others that concern the environment?
If we want to restrict ourselves simply to the product that the bill targets, a number of things can be done to change behaviour. A number of companies have branded the bags to encourage reuse and recycling. The first point is to get the message across and to encourage people to take the required measures. Although a large percentage of people do, 20 per cent of them still do not.
The concept of making a start is why we are here and is what the bill is about. The bill does not claim to be a solution to everything. Neil Young mentioned Australia and I mentioned the fact that the Australians do not believe that the voluntary approach has succeeded there.
The move in Australia has happened in one state only; it is not in the whole country.
Is it in the biggest state?
No, it is in South Australia. There is no guarantee that the measure will become law. I have been to Australia and the general feeling is that the carrier bag tax does not work because, as happened in Ireland, more packaging is being used.
We will follow up those points in particular when we have our evidence session on the Irish situation next week. We can store some of those comments and thoughts.
I have mentioned education and voluntary codes and you talked briefly about the Irish situation, about which I appreciate you will get a more detailed explanation. In Ireland, the next bit of legislation was going to be on fast-food packaging, but I understand that the Irish decided not to legislate on that and that they are now going for a voluntary code instead, which they see as the way to go in these matters.
I have a brief supplementary question for the industry representatives. What uses are there for polymers, other than making plastic bags?
If we are talking about the raw material, the polymer industry uses about 2 per cent of all the refinery capacity. As long as people continue to drive cars, the by-products that the industry uses in the manufacture of polymers will be available. If those by-products are not available for use by our industry, I do not know what will happen to them. Another use for them will have to be found. It is possible that they will be flared off, which will just put more CO2 into the atmosphere. I am not aware what other applications could be found.
It is important that the committee understands that stopping the manufacture of plastic bags will make little difference to the use of oil. The production of fuel for motor cars and aeroplanes gives us our by-product. If we do not stop producing fuel for cars and aeroplanes, the by-product will still be produced. An alternative is to flare it off into the atmosphere, which will create more CO2. A range of other products are produced. We sell 335,000 tonnes of polythene, of which less than 1,000 tonnes goes to carrier bags. The rest goes to a range of products from heavy-duty sacks to pallet protection, stretch wraps, silage stretch wraps and agricultural and horticultural film.
I want to shift the discussion back to the substitution of poly bags with paper bags, which was raised in evidence earlier this morning by Mr Young and is also mentioned in a few of the submissions. To what extent would paper bags automatically be used and to what extent are they recyclable? Will you tell us a bit about poly bag recycling and paper bag recycling? You produce both types of bag, Mr Young. Why do you assume that all the paper bags would go into landfill and not into recycling? I presume that some of your paper bags now go into recycling.
Undoubtedly some of them do, as do some of my polythene bags; the public perception is that there is a difference between our ability to recycle polythene and our ability to recycle paper, but there is none. Sainsbury's and Tesco—two major supermarkets—have collection points for plastic carrier bags. Those bags go into the back-of-store waste and are recycled into refuse sacks. Every black refuse sack that people sitting around this table use has recycled polythene in it.
I was trying to get at the issue of paper bags going automatically to landfill. We have talked about other elements of the waste campaign in Scotland. There is a big push from local authorities to get people to recycle different parts of the waste stream. Your evidence is that we can recycle and reuse poly bags. Surely we can recycle paper bags in the same way. Why do you assume that all paper bags will go automatically to landfill? There is an issue about attitudes, and we should use this discussion to flush out such issues. I am asking a direct question about the assumption that all paper bags automatically go to landfill.
I understand the argument and I accept that that does not happen. I acknowledge that some of my colleagues in the room put a huge number of tonnes of recycled paper through their plant in Scotland. However, it must also be acknowledged that John Langlands's firm, BPI, recycles a huge number of tonnes of polythene every year. My problem with the argument is that the weight of the polythene bags that the bill will affect will be a grand total of 3,500 tonnes, whereas, according to Scotland's national waste programme, 870,000 tonnes of waste paper and card go to landfill every year. If my friends in the paper industry could recycle 870,000 tonnes, I do not know where that paper would go—it would not stay in Scotland. However, they do not have the ability to recycle 870,000 tonnes of paper. Landfill at present is comprised of 26 per cent paper and card, whereas polythene makes up only 0.3 per cent.
I am questioning the assumption that all substituted paper bags would automatically go to landfill.
I acknowledge that they will not and that some of them will be recycled in exactly the same way as some plastic bags will be recycled. However, having said that, there will still be 870,000 tonnes of paper in landfill this year but only 8,000 tonnes of plastic.
We must consider the percentage of paper that is recycled at the moment. It is a sound plan to encourage more recycling and segregation of paper and card, because of the large volume of paper and card that sits in landfill right now. The measures that have been taken to encourage more recycling of paper and card are laudable but, at the moment, only a low percentage of the total volume is recycled and the rest sits in landfill. As Neil Young says, if we can change that, that would be fantastic—that is a laudable objective and is one way of reducing the volume of landfill. However, in my view, it is madness to attack something that makes an insignificant contribution to landfill and by so doing actually create more volume to recycle, at a time when we do not actually recycle the alternative product.
We accept that not all the paper bags would go to landfill, but because of the marking and advertising that goes on paper bags, they contain a lot of solvents, varnishes and inks, which makes them more difficult to recycle. We are the largest recycler of polythene film in the UK and probably in Europe—we recycle about 75,000 tonnes of polythene film a year. If you can get it to us by whatever means, we can recycle it. The stuff that we cannot turn into refuse sacks or building film we turn into Plaswood, which we use to manufacture park benches and signs, for which we have won awards and which we sell to Scottish local authorities. That is a good use of recycled products and something that must be encouraged and developed in the community.
I have two questions, the first of which is to clear up a comment in BPI's written evidence that the levy could be challenged under European Union legislation. Why did the industry not raise a challenge under EU legislation in Ireland when a levy was introduced there?
There is no plastic film industry in Ireland, although there is a strong paper industry, so there was no association to put the case together. The report that was produced for the Executive indicated that the bill's proposals would provide no significant environmental benefit. Therefore, we would challenge the proposed tax as a discriminatory one on polythene. We feel strongly enough about it to take it to the European Commission. There are examples in Europe of environmental taxes being imposed but being removed later at the EC's insistence. The most well known is the tax on aluminium cans in Denmark. The EC insisted that the legislation be changed.
That clears up that point.
If I understand your question correctly, what you are saying is that the proposed tax on plastic bags should not concern the industry because they are such a small percentage of our production. My response to that for the industry is simple. We have an excellent environmental track record and if the industry is attacked in this way, you must expect a robust response from us. We could not possibly subscribe to a bill, even though it would affect only a small percentage of total manufacture, that would effectively penalise the products that our industry supplies but not penalise possible substitute products and which would do so for no environmental gain.
That was interesting.
I realise that I am doing a lot of the speaking. Perhaps John Langlands could pick up that question.
The committee must appreciate that the weight of polythene products has reduced significantly over the past 10 to 15 years. However, although the product that we manufacture is getting thinner and thinner, it still retains its strength. More and more, polythene is replacing other products that make far more use of the world's resources. I forget whether this example has already been mentioned, but where Germany once used something like 400,000 tonnes of glass to put its coffee into, it now uses 4,000 tonnes of plastic. Those major developments have taken place over the years to improve the use of resources in the packaging industry.
I concur. The key to the matter is the efficiency of plastic, which, compared with all the other alternative materials that can be used for shopping bags, is the lightest by a mile and uses natural resources most efficiently.
We have also significantly improved our recycling processes. At the moment, 20 per cent of my products are made from recycled polythene.
Of the plastic that can be recycled, how much do you use?
If you can get me the scrap, I can recycle it.
So what is the potential increase in your market? In other words, what percentage of existing polythene can be recycled?
Not all polythene can be recycled into bags, because some of it is not allowed to come into direct contact with food. However, we could increase our recycling capacity by another 50 to 100 per cent.
So you are recycling only a small amount of the product at the moment.
Because our products come into direct contact with food, they cannot contain any recycled element from a waste stream that is made up of a mixture of different products and therefore could be contaminated.
The same constraint applies to all alternative products. There is very stringent legislation on what may come into contact with food because of the risk of contamination.
We have to consider aspects such as colouring. For example, we like black products, because that is what we can manufacture. Obviously, because the material is already tainted with various colours, black is a great colour as far as we are concerned.
Three colleagues on my right want to ask supplementary questions, and Maureen Macmillan and Elaine Smith have not asked any questions yet. We are running about 10 minutes over on this item, so I ask them to keep their questions relatively brief. After all, as we will speak to other representatives from the plastics industry, we do not need to ask these witnesses every question.
Yes, because the witnesses have not mentioned the possibilities of biodegradable plastic bags. The Co-operative Group, which gave evidence to us a few weeks ago, has gone down that road. You have mentioned using thin, recyclable plastic, but could you also use biodegradable plastic?
We do not want to encourage that alternative. Indeed, the United Kingdom Government has stated that it does not want to encourage the use of such plastics simply because 90 per cent of the product is oil. When the material degrades, that oil is lost forever.
The basic hierarchy in this respect is reduce, reuse and recycle. The major concern is that if degradable bags get into the waste stream they will inhibit or reduce our recycling effectiveness.
Another concern is that people might think that, just because the product biodegrades, they do not have to attempt to reuse or recycle it. They think that they can simply throw it away. Such an approach does not encourage people to recycle or reuse and runs counter to what we regard as good environmental practice.
Mr Langlands, you said that you felt that the proposed tax was discriminatory. I presume that you mean that the proposal should be that all disposable bags should be taxed.
The issue is that the tax, as stated, discriminates against polythene bags and does not treat paper bags and other kind of bags in the same way. That is why we think that there will not be a level playing field. I think that European legislation has been fairly strong in that regard. Further, the packaging waste directives that are issued by Europe also ask people to avoid being discriminatory. There are a number of issues from the angle of competition and the European packaging waste directives.
I am interested in the equality proofing of the proposed legislation, particularly with regard to its gender impact. Your submission says:
Our view is certainly that the tax will have a greater impact on the elderly, the less well-off and the infirm because they do not have the benefit of being able to take a car to a supermarket and will have to take their products home by bus or on foot. That will no doubt result in their paying a higher proportion of the sum that is raised by the tax.
Is there any evidence that those are the groups of people in Ireland who have to pay for plastic bags?
I can only repeat what my colleagues have said: we have been unable to obtain any evidence from Ireland.
Perhaps we can take that up.
I would not say that they threw them away. In Ireland, the packaging that is for sale has changed. They now sell woven and non-woven polypropylene bags, but they also sell packs of 25 carrier bags, packs of dog-litter bags and packs of shopping bags. On one or two occasions when I was at the check-out in Ireland, customers had picked up those packs, put them through the cash register and then put their shopping in three or four of the bags. That seemed to me to defeat the purpose of the legislation, as none of those bags was subject to the tax.
My question is for Barry Turner. You said that the number of employees in the industry has decreased in the past few decades, not only because of imports but because of the voluntary initiatives that were being pursued by retailers. However, all the witnesses have said that we should support voluntary initiatives. Is there not a contradiction there?
Why is there a contradiction? Our industry has striven to reduce the gauge of the bags that we sell in order to reduce the environmental impact. Earlier, you heard evidence about the steps that we took to do that. If we were concerned only with selling tonnes of film, we would not have bothered to do that. The fact that the supermarkets implement what should be regarded as best practice does not concern us; we would encourage that.
Therefore, the voluntary initiatives that you are talking about are those that are taken by the manufacturers to reduce the weight of the bags rather than being to do with reducing the number of bags that are issued at the check-out.
No, I did not say that.
Why has the number of employees in your industry gone down in recent decades, in that case?
If there are fewer bags in circulation, the number of employees in the industry will go down. You seem to be implying that we therefore do not want supermarkets to implement good practice. However, I am simply saying to you that we support that good practice. We have tabled good practice for the industry and have engaged the retailers in that best practice.
If we reject the bill and go down a purely voluntary route, would there still be job losses in your industry, as there have been over the past 20 years?
There might be some job losses, but I would expect this committee to focus on measures that would help to tackle the serious landfill problems rather than waste any more time on what we consider to be ill-conceived legislation.
We have asked you a lot of questions and I thank you for being prepared to answer them. I suspend the meeting to allow our panels of witnesses to change over.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
On our second panel, we have Michael Longstaffe, who is the managing director of Smith Anderson Packaging Ltd, Michael Stephen, who is the legislative adviser to the board of Symphony Plastic Technologies plc, and Karen Mackenzie, who is the director of BioBags (Scotland) Ltd. I thank our witnesses for giving us written submissions, which have helped us to form our views and to decide on questions. Again, we will move straight to questions, rather than hear opening statements.
The people on the first panel were fairly scathing about biodegradable plastic bags and feel that they have no place in the environment. I see from Karen Mackenzie's submission that her view is totally different, which one would expect, given that her company is called BioBags. Why, in detail, do you think that the way forward is to use biodegradable bags, rather than the plastic bags that we currently use or paper bags that we might use more of?
I note that you made the same mistake as most people make when you mixed up biodegradable bags with degradable bags. That perception has been a major problem in the industry; authorities, Governments and professional organisations have done much hard work to try to clarify the situation. It is not necessary to go so far. We have a European norm—EN13432—which is the harmonised standard for compostable products. That standard provides proof that an item is compostable, causes no harm and degrades totally. Nature can degrade starch and cellulose, for example, but has no ability to degrade plastic.
That is useful. Are such bags manufactured in Scotland? If not, where are they manufactured?
I believe that such bags are manufactured in England. We represent only one supplier, which is in Norway.
Does Mr Stephen want to speak?
Yes. I must respond to some of what the committee has heard from my colleague Karen Mackenzie. First, I think that she and I agree that degradable plastic bags are a much better bet than conventional plastic bags, because conventional plastic bags lie around in the environment for 15, 20 or 30 years, whereas if degradable plastic bags get into the environment, they degrade and disappear in a short time and leave no harmful residues.
I will attempt to redress the balance and to calm the debate down a little. At the start of the discussion, reference was made to recyclability, on which we would like to make a significant point. A great deal has been said about the recycling systems for polythene and paper and it is clear that I have a direct interest in the use of paper. We have a highly visible and, I hope, well-utilised recycling system in Scotland for consumers and users of paper bags. After the paper bags have been used, they can all be placed in blue wheelie bins for collection. That waste is then taken from sites around Scotland. In the main, it is collected by us in Leslie, Glenrothes, where it is converted back into paper, which is used to produce more paper bags. Recyclability is certainly an issue on which I would take issue with my friends, Michael Stephen and Karen Mackenzie. The issue is more about what is recyclable than about what is biodegradable.
Does that answer your question adequately, Maureen?
I have been given more than enough information; the discussion has been highly informative.
Oxo-biodegradable bags are properly recyclable, whereas hydro-biodegradable bags are not.
We will come back to that.
I totally disagree with what Michael Stephen said about me agreeing with him, because I do not; he is obviously not a biologist.
To be honest, it is refreshing for us to have a panel whose members do not agree 100 per cent.
I refer to Professor Gerald Scott.
I have references to a professor, too, as well as references to other experts.
We have both sets of written evidence in front of us, which is useful. We will try to tease out points of agreement and disagreement throughout today's evidence taking.
I have a few questions for Mr Longstaffe. They are probably more relevant to what we talked about with the first panel, but they relate to what Mr Longstaffe said. During our first evidence-taking session, there was much mention of the sheer volume of extra landfill that would be caused by the use of paper products. I am no scientist, but would not that paper material disappear from landfill? Is that not a basic quality of the paper that is taken to landfill?
There are two basic issues on that, which relate to substitution. It is often conveniently forgotten that if we reduce the number of bags that the supermarkets use by 95 per cent, we will be dealing with the 5 per cent that is left. It is frustrating for all of us that some of the evidence—especially from Ireland—is anecdotal, but there is well-documented experience that shows that, for paper, substitution is not a major issue. That experience is not specific to the Irish situation. Rather bizarrely, we do not think that paper will benefit hugely from the bill. There will be a moderate increase in the number of paper bags that are used, for obvious reasons, but there is a huge amount of misinformation on substitution. It seems to get forgotten that the bill would result in a huge reduction in the number of extra tonnes of waste and in the number of lorry journeys that are made. If all the figures are reduced by 95 per cent, they become significantly less of an issue.
There is another point that I want to raise, which I had wanted to raise with Mr Young. As it relates specifically to your products, it is perhaps relevant to put it to you. In his submission, Mr Young states that it is beyond him how McDonald's—I believe you supply to them—
That is an interesting point. It is interesting that many people get involved in the websites and the research. I had my collar felt by McDonald's a few days ago. About 25 per cent of our company's total turnover comes from supplying McDonald's with recycled paper bags that are produced in Scotland by a Scottish workforce, utilising Scottish waste. All the bags—including the very small fries bags—that are in direct contact with hot food are made to the standards that are required by European legislation. European legislation demands of us that recycled paper be clearly tested. As Neil Young said, we have to provide samples of all the papers that we produce. We have to abide by that legislation. All the recycled papers that we produce come from audited sources and we can clarify beyond any reasonable doubt that those papers can cope with direct food contact. Papers are produced that are not appropriate for direct food contact, but they would not be used to produce paper bags for food.
You are quite happy to make that clear for the record.
I am absolutely happy to do that. Every type of paper that is tested costs us between £1,000 and £1,500. The test is thorough and is carried out on any grade of paper that we want to put in contact with food. There is not an issue, as far as we are concerned.
Our product is also safe for food contact—that has been tested. The UK Soil Association buys our products and sells them to organic growers, who put organic food in direct contact with them. The Soil Association would not buy our products if it was not safe to put food in them or if they left in the soil the nasty fragments of polymers that we are always being told about.
That issue has been dealt with.
My next question is also on the environmental impact. The AEA Technology Environment report mentions concerns about greenhouse gas emissions, particularly from paper bags that compost in the environment and release methane. What are your concerns about that analysis?
As we say in our submission, we have concerns about the AEA report. I will not go into those concerns in depth because they are clearly pointed out in our submission but, in summary, some of the information in the report is inaccurate. The problem is that AEA's calculations magnify that inaccuracy, so it goes from what could have been a small error to a fundamentally significant tonnage.
That begins to answer the question. I ask the other two witnesses about the greenhouse gas emission impact of their products.
I am glad that you asked that question. As Mr Longstaffe said, paper produces methane as it degrades. Hydro-biodegradable plastic bags also produce methane as they degrade. The AEA report reminds us that methane is 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide as a global warming contributor. I am happy to say that our product, oxo-biodegradable plastic, does not emit methane under any conditions, even if it is put in a landfill site. If it goes deep into landfill, where there is no air, it becomes inert and does not do anything. It does not produce methane.
What about other greenhouse gases such as CO2?
All materials produce CO2. That is inevitable—it is one of the processes of nature. However, the key problem for global warming is methane, because it is 23 times more potent than CO2.
The other witnesses keep mixing things up by using the word "degrading". Only anaerobic degradation—degradation without oxygen—produces methane. That is what happens at landfill sites. We have been talking about increasing the volume and weight of material that is sent to landfill, but we are supposed to reduce that in Scotland by 25 per cent in the next few years and by 50 per cent by 2013. We should be taking material away from landfill, rather than sending it to landfill. If we compost it, we produce CO2, water and humus, which can be used in agriculture on the land, as it helps the soil. There is huge potential for using the resource in that way. Aerobic degradation through composting does not produce methane.
If I have the science right, the process depends on composting. If we do composting well and aerobically, we will not get greenhouse gas emissions. If we do not, there is potential for methane emissions.
Yes. Composting is aerobic. All biodegradable materials are subject to anaerobic degradation and gasification.
Would not it be better to recycle than to compost?
We should recycle paper, but not biodegradable putrescible waste. The best place for that to go is to compost.
Both paper and oxo-biodegradable material can be recycled. Hydro-biodegradable material cannot be recycled.
It is recyclable through composting.
I have checked the point about anaerobic or aerobic degradation. My scientific advice is that hydro-biodegradable plastic will produce methane as it degrades, either under aerobic or under anaerobic conditions. However, it produces methane faster and in greater quantities in anaerobic conditions. Oxo-biodegradable plastic produces no methane.
After this evidence-taking session, we can mull over what you have all said and go back to some of the written evidence that we have received. This has been a useful session. It does not matter to us that you disagree with one another on different points. We will have to make a judgment on how the issues pan out. It strikes me that we should go back to the waste hierarchy of reuse, recycle, recover. In our report we need to decide on the optimum that we want from the process and to think through issues of public information.
We have discussed whether it is possible for materials to be recycled. The point is that paper is recycled. Polythene is not currently recycled as polythene vest-style bags. There are some voluntary schemes by the supermarkets, but as you heard from the local authorities, there are no systems for recycling vest bags.
Someone offered earlier to recycle the bags for money if people would get them to him.
That is the whole point—we have the same scenario.
If it is oxo you do not need a special process—it can go in the normal plastic waste stream; if it is hydro it cannot.
You keep calling it hydro, but if it is hydro it is not plastic, or polyethylene.
It is.
Your bag is not biodegradable.
Yes, it is.
Right; just a moment. We will move on.
This is all fascinating, and I am sure that we will pore over it. However, I wonder whether we can get back to the bill proposal and our consideration of the evidence. How much scope the committee has to amend the bill will depend on the extent to which any amendments would be seen as changing the nature of the bill. The evidence from BioBags is that it supports the proposed levy but that it wants an exemption for compostable carrier bags. Symphony is not saying whether it supports the levy but it is saying that if there is to be a tax, non-biodegradable plastic bags and paper bags should be taxed at a higher rate. Symphony would introduce different rates of tax, whereas BioBags would introduce an exemption. I am interested in both those points of view; we will have to consider them when we decide whether amendments are necessary. If we are to have different tax rates, should the tax cover different kinds of paper bags, as well as bin-liners and other kinds of plastic bags?
If you are serious about reducing waste you must include paper bags as well as plastic bags. We heard compelling evidence this morning that otherwise all you would be doing is substituting paper waste for plastic waste. Paper waste produces methane and plastic waste does not. We would be happy with an exemption for all forms of biodegradable plastic, both hydro-biodegradable and oxo-biodegradable. The reason why we have not proposed that is that we recognise that one of the purposes of the bill is to reduce the overall quantity of plastic bags that are dispensed. For your purposes, it is no good if the same quantity of plastic bags is produced, even though they are all degradable rather than conventional. There would be a benefit, because the degradable ones would degrade if they got into the environment. However, because the object of the bill is to reduce total numbers, we have proposed a lower rate rather than an exemption.
If we want to talk about differentials, a higher tax should be charged for oxo-biodegradable bags. I can supply evidence to the committee that they are more dangerous because they turn into smaller and smaller bits, which get into the environment.
Nonsense.
I do not know whether the committee has considered evidence about the marine environment, but where there is plastic debris, the size at which oxo-degradable molecules become available to micro-organisms is too small to be seen under a microscope.
Apart from the obvious reason that you would sell more, why should your bags be exempt?
I have tried not selling biodegradable carrier bags, but I have been asked for them. I want people to use reusable bags and other alternatives. I want a change from dependence on the disposable—and that goes for everything. A few members of the committee have been teachers and will know that someone learns not by understanding the theory, but by doing. If we force people to change their behaviour, their attitudes will change. We will not change their behaviour by changing their attitudes first; we have to change their behaviour. A 20 per cent reduction in the use of plastic bags in Australia is not terribly impressive compared with a 90 per cent reduction almost immediately.
Would not putting a levy on bio-bags help with that?
The Scottish councils try to order biodegradable plastic bags for their libraries. I ask them why they do not use jute bags. I do not sell jute bags; neither have jute bags been evaluated in the extended impact assessment. A Scottish company produces most of the jute bags in this country, but their environmental effect, compared with that of plastic bags for life, has not been evaluated. There is lots of potential for other jobs, and there are possibilities for charities to use their own jute bags.
Let us be clear. Your submission states that you will
I would hope not. I would hope that compostable packaging for such things as fast food would be encouraged. However, it should be made very clear what is compostable and what is not. At the moment, even the Soil Association has a problem in understanding what is good and bad for the sustainability that we want. We need to get away from a disposable mindset.
Other countries have already used fiscal means to encourage a switch to using degradable bags. That is mentioned in paragraphs 31 to 33 of our written submission. Scotland would not be the first country to do that, if you chose to do that here. Ireland did not choose to do it, and an opportunity was missed.
Something that has not been mentioned is the fact that Germany has now introduced a tax rebate for using compostable material. Instead of charging for the use of plastic bags, a tax reduction is made for the use of compostable material. That is going to encourage the use of compostable material in the fast-food packaging industry, which causes a bigger litter problem. Also, France has banned all polyethylene carrier bags; however, we think that that is a bit extreme, as it is a big jump to go from all to zero. Those things are not in the AEA report; I do not know whether that is because the report is too old to include them. The first measure was taken in Germany in May, and the second measure was taken in France just a couple of weeks ago.
France has not banned biodegradable bags.
No.
Returning to your original question, I add the caveat that, from our perspective, the bill would suffer difficulties if it included products such as paper, which is recycled successfully. There would be a problem in forcing a levy on something that is extensively recycled. However, there is no problem because the bill does not place a levy on paper bags.
I put to you a thought that arises from that. When we spoke to the retailers last week, one or two of them said that they were already thinking of switching to paper bags simply to avoid the hassle or the disruption to their sales approach. They would have a named paper bag that would advertise their company. What is your view on that switch, which retailers would be prepared to make and which would be counterproductive to the aims of the bill? One approach would be to include paper bags in the bill to discourage them from doing that; another approach would be not to pass the bill. You produce both types of bag. What is your view?
There are two points to make. First, substitution has already happened. If you go to Princes Street, you will find paper bags used in most of the department stores. Most of the arguments for substitution on the basis of volume are allied to the larger fashion retail outlets that sell much heavier goods. If you walk down Princes Street, you will be provided with a paper bag—if you want one—by every outlet. That substitution has happened; it has not been forced to happen by the bill.
Okay. I think that has exhausted the committee's questions. I thank you all very much. That was quite a lively session. It was useful for us to be able to test out different issues, especially as we have heard from a range of witnesses over the past few weeks. The committee will consider all the evidence that we have received over the past few weeks and today. If there is anything else that any of you wants to send to us, subsequent to our discussions this morning, we will be happy to look at it. We have received extra submissions in the past, although there is obviously an issue about how much paper you want to send us. That is an invitation; choose how you want to use that offer.
We will e-mail it.
You can e-mail us stuff. Absolutely. Thank you very much.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
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