British government demands producer responsibility and deposits on everything

© Michael Gove/ Tristan Fewings – WPA Pool/Getty Images It is a really radical direction for a conservative government. Producer responsibility! has long been a cri de cœur on TreeHugger, along with Deposits on everything! Now, in the UK, Environment Secretary Michael Gove has released plans that make businesses and manufacturers responsible for paying the full cost of recycling or disposing for their packaging. Gove tells the press: Our strategy sets out how we will go further and faster, to reduce, reuse, and recycle. Together we can move away from being a ‘throw-away’ society, to one that looks at waste as a valuable resource. We will cut our reliance on single-use plastics, end confusion over household recycling, tackle the problem of packaging by making polluters pay, and end the economic, environmental and moral scandal that is food waste. Department for Environment, food and rural affairs/via There are some pretty strong measures proposed that read like a TreeHugger dream come true, including: introduce a deposit return scheme, subject to consultation, to increase the recycling of single-use drinks containers including bottles, cans, and disposable cups filled at the point of sale explore mandatory guarantees and extended warranties on products, to encourage […]

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