PRESS RELEASE : “About time,” say Welsh Conservatives as single-use plastics ban finally passes [December 2022]

The press release issued by the Welsh Conservatives on 7 December 2022.

After years of dithering and delay, the Labour Government has finally caught up with other parts of the United Kingdom in banning single-use plastics.

Today, the Environmental Protection (Single-use Plastic Products) Bill finally passed the Senedd with Welsh Conservative support.

Commenting, Welsh Conservative Shnadow Climate Change Minister Janet Finch-Saunders MS said:

“It is high time Labour banned single-use plastics as we have been saying they should for years, as has been done in the rest of Britain.

“Around 10m tonnes of plastic is dumped into the world’s oceans annually, with studies predicting that by 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish – but less than 10% of single-use plastics have been recycled, showing just how much this legislation is needed.

“I do wish that, instead of being unhelpfully and unnecessarily contrarian, the Labour Government just adopted the same definition of “single-use” as England and Scotland, but we felt that an imperfect Bill should not be allowed to torpedo the wider objective.

“Hopefully now, Labour ministers can get on with its other long-awaited environmental promises like a Clean Air Act and show it is as serious about tackling climate change as the Welsh Conservatives.”