Saving the planet on paper
Some pious soul on the radio was banging on about plastic carrier bags over the weekend basically telling us that paying what is virtually a tax on shopping was almost a penance that would cleanse our souls for past environmental sins, redemption at the checkout.
Now on the basis that the fun loving accountants and business graduates that run our retail trade, and sadly most of what is left of our industry, would not clip their toe nails unless there was a tax benefit and a profit to be made on the clippings, I am naturally suspicious of their motives in wanting to charge for bags to save the planet, particularly as the planet is not a major shareholder.
Then when Government shows an unhealthy interest in yet another way of parting us from our money that suspicion starts to become a theory in which, as usual, we the general public, are the losers.
Now here is an idea. Anyone who has been to the USA will have noticed that supermarkets there instead of plastic carriers use large, brown paper bags - almost small sacks. They are strong and not only easy to recycle, they are also biodegradeable and produced from renewable resources. They are also free.
There seems no good reason why they are not used here as indeed the now vanished Safeway did when it was US owned in its early days. Price may be a factor but if paper bags cost the supermarkets marginally more than plastic to produce then I am sure they won't mind that as their bit on behalf of the environment they seem so eager to protect - or is it save the planet only if someone else, like us, is paying.
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Roger Clarke
Birmingham’s very own Grumpy Old Man on what gets right up his nose.
Ireland has been providing free, toughened, recyclable paper carrier bags for years. And they have handles, unlike American bags.
If you want a plastic bag you pay for it, if plastic bags are provided at all.
Why do we get so het up about inane and unimportant subjects like carrier bags in this country? Don't we have anything else, like spiralling crime and feral youth, to worry about??
It might have something to do with plastic bags being an easy target with plenty of pompous huffing and puffing appeal for our politicians. Crime, drugs, violence, benefit culture, feral youth, binge drinking and all the other ills that plague the real world are a tad more difficult to deal with.
They are growing problems that need real policies and political will rather than the five or six sound bite sized initiatives that pop out of Whitehall every day like plastic toys in a box of cornflakes. There are no quick fixes either, which makes them even less attractive to our political masters who work towards the next local or General election or even the next news broadcast.
The easy answer to this plastic bag problem is to use all your old bags to line a fishpond, you will need a lot but eventually it will become watertight and then you can fill it with water and fish and plants and you can show your friends.This will not work in a highrise flat.As you start to accumulate more bags you can enlarge your pond and evetually all the countries back gardens will be full just in time to meet the rising sea levels due to global warming and by then no one will be shopping except at the Ideal Boat Show. Simple?