Europe's local governments call for 80% reduction and ban of free plastic bags

Plans to reduce the number of plastic bags in Europe came under fire today as local and regional authorities criticised the proposals as lacking ambition. With nearly 100 billion plastic bags used each year, members of the EU’s Committee of the Regions approved a report setting out far tougher proposals than those laid out by the European Commission. The Committee calls for an outright ban of free plastic bags by 2020, mandatory EU targets to reduce the number of single-use plastic bags for all member states and obligatory charges for all carrier bags.

There is broad consensus that something must be done to curb the growing numbers of plastic bags with estimations indicating the average EU citizen uses 198 plastic carrier bags each year, 90% of which are lightweight. Nevertheless, deciding the right approach that must be taken by the EU has been the focus of much debate and was centre of discussions of an opinion led by UK’s Cllr Linda Gillham from Runnymede Borough Council. The Committee’s members unanimously voted in favour of the opinion which recognises that there are a range of different measures already put in place by member states from voluntary charging in Belgium, Denmark and Ireland, to an outright ban of non-biodegradable carrier bags in Italy.

Nevertheless, the Committee’s members raised concerned that action must be taken to deal with the considerable differences between member states with figures suggesting that in some countries, such as Denmark and Finland, the average number of use is 4 plastic bags per person in comparison to 466 in Poland, Portugal and Slovakia. In contrast to the original plans released by the Commission, the Committee wants to broaden the scope of the definition of single-use plastic bags, ban all single-use plastic bags by 2020 and introduce mandatory charging for multi-use carrier bags. With the environmental impact especially on marine life well documented, binding EU-level reduction and prevention targets, instead of voluntary national reduction targets, must also be introduced.

Cllr Gillham commented: "Plastic waste in our environment, especially in the seas, is a global problem. Introducing mandatory charges for plastic bags is a simple and sensible step forward for Europe. This measure reduces the number of lightweight plastic bags that too easily blow around getting caught in trees and washed into the seas, whilst raising money to help with the clean-up".