Responding to the Scottish Government’s Ministerial Statement on
Moving Towards a Circular
Economy, Ewan MacDonald-Russell, Scottish
Retail Consortium Head of Policy, said:
“It’s six months after government commissioned a gateway review
into the Scottish deposit return scheme and retailers – who are
absolutely critical to its successful implementation - are little
wiser on when stores must be ready to take back containers.
Retailers will raise a weary eyebrow that after this
long-postponed announcement there will be a further delay until
they receive clarity and visibility on the launch of the scheme.
This process has been drawn out to a pretty farcical degree – and
needs urgently resolved. A new go-live date, no earlier
than 2023, needs to be confirmed swiftly.
“Nonetheless the likelihood of a delay will be welcome
news. Whilst retailers have already made significant
investment to prepare for the scheme, there was no realistic
chance they could accommodate the impact of the Covid pandemic
without impact, never mind the further challenges presented by EU
exit and the UK Government decision to apply VAT to the 20p
deposit that customers will face. With no realistic chance of the
scheme being successfully launched next year, the Scottish
Government needs to announce a new go live date which will allow
retailers to focus their efforts on delivering an ambitious world
class deposit return scheme.”
