The infamous and anonymous tweeter Elizabeth Windsor posted “How the BBC can broadcast a programme called "Crimewatch" without mention of a single Government policy, one will never know.” But Nick Clegg, Deputy Prime Minister & leader of the Liberal-Democrats will announce a classic well-intentioned piece of policy at his upcoming party conference which, like all progressivism, will cause more problems than it solves.
Clegg will announce, ironically in Scotland, that England will begin to charge 5p for plastic bags at the supermarket. The idea is Liberal Democratic Party policy but will be introduced by the government coalition, following implementation in Wales & Northern Ireland that has seen a dramatic drop in bag usage.
Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Davey told Sky News “"Liberal Democrats in the coalition are pushing the green agenda all the time. Sometimes it's quite a fight - this one we've won and it's very clear the evidence shows that plastic bags not only create lots of litter and a real eyesore, but they can be really bad for wild animals, particularly marine life." He then told the BBC "We are very clear that none of this money will come to government, we are not trying to tax people, we are trying to change people's behaviour, encourage much more environmentally-friendly behaviour."
The government has been quick and repetitive in pointing out that this is not a tax, with the money going to charities involved in environmental damage cleanup. But anytime the government mandates that money is forcibly taken from people under qualifying circumstances it generally is considered a tax and is occasionally considered a fine or just plain theft.
Mr. Davey’s assertion that none of the money will come to the government t is very dubious since there has to be a collection system of some kind. How the money will be collected and how it will be decided which charities get the money has not been explained.
Matthew Sinclair, from the Taxpayers' Alliance, countered that the charge would have little impact. He said "This is not just a small share of waste, this is a tiny share of waste, and I don't think that for every problem the answer is a new tax. Supermarkets have already been encouraging customers to reduce their use of carrier bags. There are already a number of different schemes to encourage people to think about using reusable bags, there are other schemes which involve using the carrot rather than the stick of a new tax."
Jonathan Sheppard from Tory Radio highlighted that this is just an example of the Lib-Dems saying ‘look at us we’re going green’ when in fact they are just highlighting a single example and claiming to have championed the problem. Sheppard tweeted “If advocates of plastic bag tax like it as it cuts use, will they advocate a tax of something making up 6 % of landfill? Disposable nappies”
As always with progressive laws there are unintended consequences. Based on available figures the ban will reduce bag usage by 75-80%. That will cost the nation approximately 4000 manufacturing jobs. If each unemployed person gets £100/week or £5000/year in benefits as a result that equals £20 million per year, or about 70p per working person in taxes.
However the cleanliness issues are what should really be considered and haven’t even been mentioned. According to American law professors Jonathan Klick and Joshua Wright San Francisco’s bag ban resulted in a 46 percent increase in deaths from foodborne illnesses, or 5.5 more of them each year. Per capita that would translate into about 350 deaths a year in England.
What happens is people start using cloth type bags instead and if meat and vegetables are stored together, coupled with the shopper not going straight home, then bacteria develops. 51% of reusable bags hold coliform bacteria. Washing the bags really helps but research shows only 3% of reusable bag users do so regularly.
If 75% of the 20 million households in England stop using plastic bags and the rest use 10 per week we’ll raise £130 million per year for charity offset indirectly by the £20 million extra for the unemployed. It’s still a nice pot of money which charities will not sit idly by hoping to get a piece of. Au contraire the political dealings to get their hands on it could offset daily Chicago politics. Expect significant wheeling and dealing between charity heads and politicians.
In the end plastic bags can now be made bio-degradable and the peripheral problems like littering can continue to be combated via education. Banning or taxing bags achieves little but stands to kick-off a whole new set of problems. Englanders are already moving away from using plastic bags, do we really need another bureaucracy to speed up the process with all the baggage it brings?
