Asked by
To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of
the effect of the Scottish Government’s bottle Deposit return scheme
upon (1) the internal market between Scotland and England and (2)
UK manufacturers, businesses and consumers.
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural
Affairs () (Con)
My Lords, as waste policy is a devolved matter, the Scottish
Government have opted to roll out a DRS independently of the rest
of the UK, due to launch on 16 August this year. We remain in
close contact with officials and industry to learn from the
delivery of the Scottish scheme and align on key decisions
wherever possible.
(Con)
My Lords, that Answer simply is not good enough. This is a
unilateral scheme that has been completely ill thought out.
Indeed, one of the candidates for the SNP leadership has said it
should be cancelled. The deadline for businesses to register is
tomorrow. It means a death sentence for small producers of
beverages and price increases for Scottish consumers, and it
drives a coach and horses through the UK internal market. It
requires an opt-out from the internal market Act to proceed. Will
my noble friend throw a lifeline to those businesses and
consumers?
(Con)
Let us see whether I can try to encourage my noble friend with
this reply. The Government have not yet received an official
ministerial request from the Scottish Government for a United
Kingdom internal market exemption. There have been discussions at
official level. He is entirely right to point out the failures of
the Scottish scheme and the impact it will have on Scottish
businesses. In November some 600 businesses wrote to the Scottish
Minister outlining various reasons why the Deposit
return scheme is going to fail in Scotland. These include a
risk of fraud, major losses in consumer spend, loss of investment
in the Scottish economy, and financial and environmental
implications for local authorities.
I have to wait and see whether the Scottish Government apply for
a UKIM exemption, and then I can answer my noble friend’s
question. One of the front-runners to lead the SNP has announced
that if it rolls out in Scotland in August as planned, it will
create “carnage”. I agree.
(LD)
My Lords, will the Minister accept that the Minister in charge in
Scotland, , has acknowledged that she
has not yet submitted a request, she has not consulted any other
Governments which have implemented a scheme, and she has no idea
how it is going to work but insists it is still going ahead? Is
not the reality that we need a UK-wide scheme that will meet the
needs of people in Scotland and elsewhere, where it is extremely
divisive and clearly incompetent, and, if we have a UK-wide
scheme, the Government’s responsibility is to press ahead with it
as quickly as possible?
(Con)
The noble Lord is exactly right. If we were indulging in grown-up
politics across all the Governments, we would have a scheme that
acknowledged that waste is a devolved but aligned issue. There is
undoubtedly an environmental benefit from reducing the amount of
waste going to landfill and the amount of litter plaguing our
highways, in particular. It is possible to run a perfectly
sensible scheme. We have been discussing a scheme with the Welsh
and Northern Irish Governments, but it should be run in alignment
right across these islands. The Scottish Government have sought
to appear more virtuous and to rush this, and they have failed
the Scottish people and Scottish businesses. The scheme will
result in huge costs and even the risk of booze cruises, so that
people can go south of the border to get drink at 50% less cost.
This is entirely ridiculous. We want to work with the people of
Scotland to make sure we align on this.
(Lab Co-op)
My Lords, for once I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth—and
that does not happen very often. However, I fear the Minister has
underestimated the seriousness of this matter. The Minister
dealing with this appeared on television in Scotland yesterday.
Although participating manufacturers have to sign up by
Tuesday—tomorrow—she said she is reviewing whether there will be
a delay of a year. This is total chaos. If the Minister can
imagine the situation, if this goes ahead, manufacturers,
including small manufacturers, will have to produce separate
bottles and cans for Scotland and for England, which will be
enormously expensive. If they do not, can he imagine the trade
that might take place at Carlisle or Gretna, with people
gathering the bottles that are worth 10p and going from England
to Scotland and making hundreds and thousands of pounds. The
whole thing is total chaos. This is a very good idea, but it must
be done on a United Kingdom basis, so there is not this
confusion. Will the Minister talk immediately with the Secretary
of State for Scotland and see if he can impose Section 35 of the
Scotland Act, stop this nonsense straight away and make sure a UK
scheme is introduced, which would benefit the whole of the United
Kingdom?
(Con)
I cannot disagree at all with the noble Lord. I agree with
everything he said and assure him that I spoke to the Secretary
of State for Scotland on this matter this morning. He is
absolutely resolute that the points raised by the noble Lord are
the case and are a serious problem, particularly in cross-border
trade—even the letter that I quoted earlier talks about the risk
of fraud. But this fits in with a pattern—on educational
attainment, on ferries, on drug policy—that the people of his
country have to endure with the Government in Scotland. We want
to make sure that on environmental policy such as this there is
an alignment. It is perfectly possible for all four countries of
the union to work through a scheme and implement it gently, in
way that does not have great inflationary costs and does not
damage business, but that works with the grain of public opinion,
which wants to see more recycling, less litter and a scheme that
works.
(Con)
My Lords, I went litter-picking at the weekend and I am much
encouraged by what the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, said. Do I
understand that, if I were to fill a lorry with all the empty
bottles scattered around the lanes of Leicestershire, I could go
up to Scotland and make a great deal of money? This is most
encouraging as far as I am concerned. I should say that I raised
the issue of bottle deposits in my maiden speech in the Commons
some 31 years ago.
(Con)
I can only applaud my noble friend for his virtuous activities at
weekends, but, sadly, I have to report that I do not think he
would be able to do that. For the Scottish scheme to work, an
English drinks manufacturing company, say, would be required to
produce a labelled item in a particular way so that it could not
be deposited there. The current system is Kafkaesque and it has
to be more sensible.
of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, in answer to my Written Question on this issue at the
beginning of January, the Minister replied:
“Waste is a devolved policy area, and we are working closely with
the devolved administrations and industry to support the
successful delivery of the scheme across the UK, including
mitigating the impacts that arise from differences in scheme
implementation.”
Can he tell us what progress has been made since then, beyond the
publication of the consultation response? While, clearly, we
should not impose a system on Scotland, this opens a window of
opportunity for the constituent parts of the UK to agree a joint
approach, as other noble Lords have said. Are the Government
willing to have the discussions needed to achieve this?
(Con)
Yes, and we are having those discussions. We are also looking at
other countries that run successful Deposit
return schemes to try to learn from their successes, just as
we are learning from the failures of the Scottish system, and we
want to ensure alignment across the United Kingdom. I am
absolutely on the same page as the noble Baroness.
(GP)
My Lords, the Minister said in response to the noble Lord, , that not everything being
painted here is an accurate picture, and he spoke about a
so-called “rush”. These regulations were passed by the Scottish
devolved Administration in September 2020; as I believe the
Minister confirmed, discussions started with Westminster in 2021;
it is now 2023. Biffa, the delivery body for Circularity
Scotland, has spent £100 million and 500 jobs are being created.
The very principle that this Government say they stand for,
“polluter pays”, is being delivered. Does the Minister agree
that, if the Government step in at this very late stage—if
Westminster stops Scotland delivering what it has a right to do
under devolved law—that will mean a collapse in business
confidence and we will never see a bottle deposit scheme across
these islands after Westminster steps into this business?
(Con)
I think all of us will feel great sympathy for the noble Baroness
in trying to defend what her party is doing as part of a
coalition of abject failure. She talks about business; I can only
quote what business says:
“Tens of thousands of businesses who produce, can, bottle,
distribute, or sell alcoholic or soft drinks in Scotland now have
less than a year to successfully adapt their operations, without
the necessary knowledge or levers in place.”
It is not the principle of a Deposit
return scheme—I suspect some of us are old enough to
remember the thruppenny bit—but how it is implemented. That, I am
afraid to say, is right at the heart of the problem at
Holyrood.
(Lab)
Can the Minister tell us what will happen on His Majesty’s
warships in relation to beverages? Not that we have many
warships, so it is not too big a problem—but will it apply or
not?
(Con)
My Sunday evening has been enhanced by watching what happens to
waste on an aircraft carrier and recycling on these facilities.
If it lands at Rosyth or Portsmouth, will there be a different
scheme? We can say only that it is a mystery wrapped in enigma
inside a riddle.
