Excess Packaging

Thank you presiding officer. I'm gratefull to be speaking on my second members' debate in the Liberal Democrat slot, in under a year.

I've no doubt that the fact that we have too much packaging is something which resonates with all of us here this evening and also everyone whether they are constituents, environmental groups, neighbours, friends or family members.

We are all consumers, and we do come across excess packaging daily. A trip to the supermarket results in the accumulation of what seems like endless amounts of card, foil and plastic - much of which is disposed of as soon as we get home. The UK Government's Waste Resources Action Programme says that families in the UK now spend some £470 on packaging each year - one sixth of their food budget.

To put it into context, the UK dumps 5 million tonnes of packaging each year - Scotland's share of that is 1 million tonnes.

A recent survey by my Libdem MP colleague in Westminster, Jo Swinson, found that Easter Eggs take up as little as 9% of the volume of their total packaging!

The UK Government's regulations on excess packaging are not working to best effect and much has to be done to look at ways to toughen these laws so that retailers take seriously their role in reducing excess packaging. The commitments companies have made to reduce packaging are on a voluntary basis at present. We need to monitor properly the progress they make to see that these commitments are met. We therefore need binding packaging reduction targets to be met by producers and retailers, to replace current voluntary commitments and I hope the Minister will be able to advise on that point.

But we also need to empower consumers, giving them greater choice over how much excess packaging they buy, as well as making sure extra costs for producers are not simply passed on to shoppers.

My colleague, Mike Pringle, is no stranger to this issue either given all his work on his plastic bags bill.

And I've also just completed my own survey on excess packaging - an overwhelming 95% of the respondents said that there is too much packaging attached to the goods we buy.

Crucially, 85% felt that retailers could help in tackling the problem and 90% felt that we as consumers could also help in tackling the problem. Whilst perhaps not addressing the problem of reducing packaging and preventing waste in the first place, 95% felt that any packaging should at the very least be designed to be biodegradable. So we need to see more work with manufacturers to ensure that where packaging cannot be reduced any further, whatever packaging remains can be left to degrade safely.

Sadly from the survey, only 4% of the respondents said we're doing enough as a nation to recycle, only 4% said we use our waste efficiently and only 19% felt that there are enough facilities locally to allow them to recycle all of their waste. The good news is that 71% respondents said they would like to recycle more.

So we have an opportunity here to really do something positive, to fill the gap between what people want to happen and what is actually happening and available.

The UK Government's waste strategy fails to address the need for constructive changes to the currently ineffective Packaging (Essential Requirements) Regulations. Trading Standards departments should be provided with adequate resources to effectively tackle producers of excessive packaging. The UK government has also failed to meet the UK wide targets for packaging reduction set by the EU and I know that my colleagues in London are working hard to secure improvements.

But in Scotland I hope that the Scottish Government realises it needs to make tackling excess packaging a priority for its new waste strategy. Not least to meet the EU's Waste Management directive targets.

After all there's no doubt that prevention is better than cure.

We need to make recycling easier for consumers - let's have large supermarkets providing waste points in stores where customers can deposit unwanted packaging. We have already seen people in stores protesting by taking off the packaging in the middle of the supermarkets and leaving it for stores to deal with, something of course I wouldn't condone, but I am sure there is an opportunity for Supermarkets to take the lead and show their corporate responsibility. And there are early signs that some of them are slowly awakening to this. What a well worthwhile advert for any business, if they offered to take back any waste packaging from their products sold. The supermarket summit is looming, and I am sure there are many issues that need to be discussed there, including local food and fair trade for producers. But excessive packaging has to be on the agenda, as it affects everyone.

But supermarkets can't take all the blame, although they are in a powerful position to demand to their suppliers that they work in to their products a more sustainable approach. Product designers and manufacturers may then realise that there is an opportunity to sell their products to a market who would appreciate that lesser packaging is better, and gain a unique selling point, such as the growing organic sector has found and exploited well.

Local authorities too, some are providing recycling facilities, but not across the board, people need to have the availability of recycling facilitites. Let's make it easy for people.

Work to build the ECO-DECO Intelligent Transfer Station in Dumfries started at the end of January 2005. It is now fully operational. It processes up to 65,000 tonnes of waste a year from the west of the region, and could do more. It works on a very simple idea - it dries out the waste, sorts out glass, stones and metals for recycling and recovers a fuel. The small amount that can't be dealt with in this process is then landfilled, that being only 9% of the original mass. The beauty of this type of treatment facility is that people don't have to sort out their kerbside waste - although that does not educate people to get into the habit of recycling it perhaps is some small answer for households which are in areas where recycling facilities are poor or non existent.

Presiding Officer, I hope that the Scottish Government will be in a position to introduce binding packaging reduction targets for producers and retailers in order to significantly reduce this amount of waste. I look to the Minister for assurances that that will indeed be the case and that all of the foregoing points will be addressed in the forthcoming supermarket summit - I hope that he will put excess packaging right up there as a top priority in the Scottish Government's Waste Strategy and I look forward to hearing from him this evening with some positive actions.

Lets stop wasting time, because its time to stop waste.

Thank you.