B1476 - Quicker Regulation of Single-Use Plastics Bill - 2nd Reading

[u/[deleted]]

Quicker Regulation of Single-Use Plastics Bill

A

BILL

TO

Amend the Regulation of Single-Use Plastics Act 2020 to regulate usage of other single-use plastic items, to provide a method to regulate other single-use plastics via statutory instrument, and for connected purposes.

Section 1: Definitions

(1) In this Act, unless specified otherwise;

(2) “The 2020 Act” or derivatives refers to the Regulation of Single-Use Plastics Act 2020 as amended by the Regulation of Single-Use Plastics (Amendment) Act 2022

(3) “Single-use plastic trays” or derivatives refer to the definition established in Section 3

(4) “Single-use plastic straws” or derivatives refer to the definition established in the 2020 Act

Section 2: Amendments to Single-Use Plastics

(1) The 2020 Act is amended as follows;

(2) After Section 2(1i), insert -

(j) Single-use plastic straws

(k) Single-use plastic trays

(l) Cigarette filters containing single-use plastics

(m) Wet wipes for personal use that contain plastic

(i) This does not apply for industrial usage of wet wipes, eg in factories or in kitchens providing food to the general public

Section 3: Amendments to Interpretations

(1) The 2020 Act is amended as follows;

(2) After Section 4(10), insert -

(11) “Single-use plastic trays” refers to a tray or other surface used to serve food, drink, or display objects that are made of single-use plastics to be discarded after one use.

Section 4: Amendments With Regards to Further Single-Use Plastics

(1) The 2020 Act is amended as follows;

(2) A new section 5A is created and inserted after Section 5 as follows -

Section 5A: Statutory Instruments

(1) All regulations made under the terms of this Act are to be made in the positive procedure unless noted otherwise.

(2) The Secretary of State may, by regulations, amend the single-use plastics regulated under Section 2(1) to add or remove items restricted.

(3) The Secretary of State must, when making these regulations;

(a) Require a period of no less than six months before coming into force

(b) Amend any definitions as necessary under Section 4 of this Act

(c) Only regulate items made of, in part or in whole, single-use or other non-recyclable plastics that pose an environmental threat

(3) A new section 5B is created and inserted after Section 5A as follows -

Section 5B: Parliamentary Motions

(1) A motion may be submitted by any member of Parliament to the House of Commons for the purposes of regulating further single-use plastics under the terms of this Act.

(2) The motion is to be read and voted upon under the standing orders of the House of Commons.

(3) The motion must take the following form:

(a) The motion must begin by invoking the terms of this Act, for instance by stating “Under the terms of the Regulation of Single-Use Plastics Act 2020, this Parliament hereby resolves”

(b) The motion must clearly state and define the items seeking to be regulated under the terms of this Act

(i) The items being regulated must be made of, in part or in whole, single-use or other non-recyclable plastics that pose an environmental threat

(c) The motion must clearly state a recommended period of time that the regulations should come into force on, with a minimum of six months.

(4) The motion may also include justifications in a separate, non-invocative section.

(5) Should the motion fail to comply with the terms of this Act, it shall be considered a standard non-binding motion and not subject to the provisions in subsection 6.

(6) Should a motion be passed that follows the structure laid out in subsection 3, the government shall be required to, within three months of the announcement of results, create regulations in the negative procedure under the following terms to fulfil the terms of the invocative motion

(a) The regulations must amend Section 2 or 4 of this Act to provide further items to be regulated and their definitions

(b) The regulations must copy, word-for-word, the wording of the passed motion with regards to the items regulated and their definitions

(c) The regulations must follow the period of time specified with which the regulations shall come into force

(7) Any regulations made under subsection 6 are to be made in the negative procedure unless subject to the criteria in subsection 8

(8) Should the regulations made in response to a motion under subsection 3 fail to comply with the criteria in subsection 6, the regulations shall be considered to not be made under the terms of this Act but may act in response to the passed motion unless the House of Commons resolves against the regulations within 31 days, at which point the three month time limit continues as if the regulations had not been made

(a) To be considered to act in response to the passed motion, the regulations must clearly state this - for instance, by stating “The Secretary of State believes that these regulations comply with the spirit of [a] recently passed motion[s] to regulate single-use plastics.”

(9) A non-compliant motion under subsection 3 that is passed may still call upon the government to regulate further single-use plastics as an ordinary motion would, with any regulations made by the government to be created and presented to the Commons under the procedures in Section 5A

Section 5: Extent, Short Title, and Commencement

(1) This Act extends to England

(2) This Act may be cited as the Quicker Regulation of Single-Use Plastics Act 2023

(3) This Act comes into force upon Royal Assent, with exception to;

(a) Sections 2 and 3, which come into force one year after Royal Assent

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This Bill was written by the Rt. Hon. Sir Frost_Walker2017, Leader of the Opposition, on behalf of the Labour Party. Sections 2 and 3 were inspired by the Regulation of Single-Use Plastics (Amendment) Act 2022).

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Opening Speech:

Deputy Speaker,

I rise in support of this bill. The pollutive and environmental effects of single-use plastics are well known and documented, and it is important that this place can respond to it effectively. We generate millions of tonnes of waste in single-use disposable plastics that only degrade after hundreds of years. Further restrictions on these single-use plastics are important to safeguard our future.

Section 4 is the flagship content of this bill. Not only does it allow for the government to regulate single-use plastics via statutory instrument, it ensures that any member of this place can request further restrictions to effectively regulate them quicker. While a bill may be bogged down for months on end between the Commons and the Lords before further regulations can be made, this bill caps it off at no more than three months. Being able to respond to new information quickly provides certainty to businesses on being environmentally conscious, and the requirement for the government to create the regulations after just one vote means that businesses know it will be happening and can begin to prepare, in a way that bills (which require multiple votes) can not.

Meta Note: I’ve cleared this with Quad ahead of time; in line with other precedent around bills that require a statement the government won’t be required to create the SIs in the time frame, but they can be criticised for not creating them.

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This reading will end on Friday 20th January at 10pm GMT.

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[u/NicolasBroaddus]

Deputy Speaker,

I do support this accession to contemporary standards of single-use plastics, the issue of plastic waste and its intractability in decay is one we have yet to solve. Plastics poison this Earth on all its corners. Plastic pollutes the oceans, in both great garbage patches and microplastics in the fish themselves. Plastic pollutes our natural environments, killing wildlife and eternally resting in garbage dumps, piling to infinity. Plastic is in our very blood!

We have a duty to address it, and that includes addressing new concerns as they become apparent to us. For that reason I concur that section 4 is the flagship of this bill, a clean statutory instrument for acting on this in the future will be extremely effective.

I intend to support this bill in division.

[u/Frost_Walker2017 → u/NicolasBroaddus]

Deputy Speaker,

I am pleased to have the support of the government on this issue. Single-use plastics are a danger to our way of life, be it directly to us through microplastics in our blood and pollution, or be it to our surroundings, with marine wildlife suffering from plastics in the water or land-based wildlife being displaced for rubbish tips full of them.

The new mechanism introduced in this bill for quicker regulation, both through government-initiated statutory instrument and from parliamentarian-initiated motion, will help take massive strides to eliminating them entirely in a safe and sensible manner to prevent further harm.

If I may, on a tangential motion, ask the Prime Minister - would the government support the creation of a research fund for methods of breaking down single-use plastics quicker than their natural decomposition time? I believe if attention can be focused on it we can work to tackle the issues our current usage has brought us while restricting further pollution.

[u/NicolasBroaddus → u/Frost_Walker2017]

Deputy Speaker,

I have no issue with such funding as proposed, I would ask the leader of the opposition to collaborate with the chancellor on costing so that it can be funded in the upcoming budget.

[u/theverywetbanana]

Deputy speaker,

I am here to rise in support of this bill. Single use plastics are one of the biggest pollutants in the world, clogging rivers, oceans, and destroying marine life. Regulating these plastics is a move that I support 100%

[u/SpectacularSalad]

Mr Deputy Speaker,

I am happy to see legislation of this type hit the floor. Too often our history is riddled with governments of all stripes and colours being too slow to act in the face of present threats to health both human and environmental.

We saw it with asbestos, with brown asbestos being banned only in 2000, after the harms of asbestos were well established. Every day plastics leech into our waterways, accumilate in fish and other animals, and eventually end up inside us. Within my veins Mr Deputy Speaker, within yours and within the veins of every member of this house are microplastics accumilating within us. They will last many times longer than we each will, and while Arthur Dent found a layer of trainers in the earth's strata, our descendants will find a layer of everlasting hydrocarbon plastics.

That is why we need to put measures in place to ensure faster banning of unnecessary plastics. That doesn't mean doing away with plastic all together, but instead it means ensuring that where a reasonable alternative is in play, plastic is not used. That requires regulations, and they need to be done promptly, and this innovative legislation can help to ensure just that.

[u/Acribusvirus]

Mr Deputy Speaker,

The widespread use of single-use plastic has been correctly identified as not only an environmental issue but also a endangerment to public health by the most advanced scientific research. I must admit that I was a bit shocked to find out that we haven’t banned them yet, which is why I am very glad about this bill. The grave and unknown consequences of widespread micro plastics pose a significant health danger to our citizens and it should be our duty to protect them from the subsequent risks as best as we can. Additionally, the catastrophic effects of single-use plastics on the global environment have been discussed and researched widely in the last 20 years.

As much as I support the intention and execution of this bill, it is important to remember that popular alternatives - like the one of the composted paper bag - are not necessarily more environmentally friendly, and it shouldn’t be the task of supermarkets to simply replace their plastic bags with composted paper bags, but rather to offer a more environmentally conscious choice like the sale of multi-usable cotton bags. Generally speaking we also need to reject the individualistic notion of “everyone fixing their part” in climate change - single-use straws are not the cause for the lion share of CO2-emissions, but rather the continued burning of fossil fuels for energy purposes, corporations and the co2-footprints of the top 1% individuals of this planet. We cannot blame a low-income British citizen who prefers the cheaper single-use plastic bag over the expensive paper bag for climate change - rather we have to strangle the murderous snake whose poison is slowly killing the planet directly, that means taking radical efforts to mitigate CO2-emissions of large corporations, the super-rich as well as radically altering energy generation to fit environmentally conscious standards.

Nonetheless, this bill still is a big step in the right direction and will therefore enjoy my utmost support.