Stores giving out more plastic carriers than ever

[Iceflower]

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/four-hundred-million-more-plastic-bags-handed-out-in-supermarkets-last-year-7917787.html

The article seems to put the increase down to shoppers buying less more often. It also says more shoppers are using public transport, and are less likely to bring reusable bags. Campaigners are urging for a tax on bags to turn the tide back.

I love free plastic carriers as I use them more than once, and also as bin liners. This surely is recycling, and no worse than buying and using bin liners?

It's those of us who live in Wales stocking up when we cross the border

Ha! I thought, not in Wales where you have to pay at least 5p!

I do think this is annoying, and doing small top-up shops is no excuse for not bringing a bag. I have a very unstylish large handbag which hosts 4 linen bags - with those, I can actually do quite a big stop.

This is really about developing good habits, and I think charging for plastic bags is the only way to sort it.

I can honestly say - and yes, I am going to sound bloody smug - that I haven't used a supermarket plastic bag since 2007.

I almost always have a re-usable bags about my person.

However, like OP I'm glad to have a few supermarket bags to line bins and for other household purposes. I'd have to buy a roll of plastic bags otherwise so there'd be no environmental benefit.

Speaking anecdotally, a few years ago there always used to be loads of plastic bags from the nearby shops littering our street and worse, caught in the trees, but now I never see any. I find this hard to reconcile with the 'more bags being handed out' report.

Agree bags should be charged for, government should enforce it for all supermarkets, min 5p a bag and people will soon start recycling more.

I found Bags for Life prone to splitting and they never held as much as I thought they would. I reuse regular carriers when I remember

I live in Wales too, am always surprised to be offered bags for free if 'abroad'.

What I don't understand is why can't we have biodegradeable bags instead of plastic? If the debate is about them taking forever and ever to degrade, then a paper based bag is surely a much better option?

I also live in Wales and think the 5p fee for a bag (or 10p for a good one!) is great.

It's no hardship to stick a folded up bag in your handbag just in case you do an impulse top up shop.

Best of all though, The number of plastic carrier bags given out has reduced by NINETY PERCENT!

Also, what critics don't realise is that the 5p fee doesn't go to the supermarkets, it has to go to charity and a lot of these are environmental charities.

I think it's been a great scheme and should be rolled out across the whole of the UK.

I would pay at the till for a plain bag.

But not for one with the shop's advertising material all over it. Perhaps the shops should be charged per bag for this form of advertising.

Edith- a lot of shops in Wales bags for life with a generic design on so it's not immediately obvious whether your bag for life is from Asda, Sainsburys or Tesco.

I don't see the harm in people knowing where I got my shopping from if they have put effectively put 5p toward an environmental charity.

It's M&S that flummox me.

5p for a carrier in the food hall, but the rest of the shop stuff things automatically in a carrier even if you have a bag over your arm.

Yesterday the assistant put a cheap tie in a box and then a carrier. I had a half empty M&S carrier from downstairs already in my hand.

at why DHs posh silk tie didn't get a box the other day