NEW NATIONAL LITTER DAY PROPOSED AS DEPOSITS WOULD HAVE LAUNCHED
APRS media release
Action to Protect Rural Scotland1APRS (Action to Protect Rural Scotland) is Scotland’s countryside charity. We campaign to promote, enhance and protect Scotland’s countryside and rural landscapes for everyone’s benefit, and support others to do the same. We have been running the Have You Got the Bottle? campaign since 2014, advocating for a successful and comprehensive deposit return scheme for Scotland.
https://aprs.scot/ has today proposed that 16th August 2023 be Scotland’s first annual National Litter Day, marking the day Scotland’s much-delayed deposit return system for cans and bottles should have finally come into effect.
Based on 2019 numbers,2In 2021, Reloop, an international non-profit organisation specialising in resource and waste policy, calculated that in 2019, 920.2 million containers were wasted across Scotland, in other words littered in our countryside and our towns and cities, lost into the marine environment, landfilled, or incinerated. 437.4 million of that total were cans, 334.9 million were PET plastic bottles, and 147.9 million were glass bottles – although the real figures will be higher, as this dataset does not include wines and spirits. For the full report, see:
https://www.reloopplatform.org/resources/what-we-waste/ 920.2 million drinks cans and bottles are wasted every year across Scotland, meaning more than 2.2 billion items which would have been covered by a deposit system if it had begun when originally planned, on 1st April 2021.
Dr Kat Jones, Director of Action to Protect Rural Scotland, said:
“Every day, more than 2.5 million cans and bottles are wasted across Scotland, resources lost to landfill and incineration or abandoned in our environment. Today should have been the day we started, as a society, to get on top of this problem via deposit return, but a combination of corporate lobbying, Westminster interference and Scottish Government timidity means it’s business as usual yet again.
“With that in mind, we think this date is a fitting day to mark Scotland’s first National Litter Day. A day when the lobbyists who sought to block Scotland’s deposit return scheme can congratulate themselves on the success of their campaign, while our communities and environment suffer another year with so much avoidable litter.
“Every day we fall further behind Europe on waste, litter and the circular economy. At any point UK Ministers could abandon their disruptive ban on the inclusion of glass, and at any point Scottish Ministers could bring in deposits on cans and plastic bottles. If neither change their approach many more National Litter Days await Scotland’s towns, beaches and countryside.”
Notes
- APRS (Action to Protect Rural Scotland) is Scotland’s countryside charity. We campaign to promote, enhance and protect Scotland’s countryside and rural landscapes for everyone’s benefit, and support others to do the same. We have been running the Have You Got the Bottle? campaign since 2014, advocating for a successful and comprehensive deposit return scheme for Scotland.
https://aprs.scot/ - In 2021, Reloop, an international non-profit organisation specialising in resource and waste policy, calculated that in 2019, 920.2 million containers were wasted across Scotland, in other words littered in our countryside and our towns and cities, lost into the marine environment, landfilled, or incinerated. 437.4 million of that total were cans, 334.9 million were PET plastic bottles, and 147.9 million were glass bottles – although the real figures will be higher, as this dataset does not include wines and spirits. For the full report, see:
https://www.reloopplatform.org/resources/what-we-waste/
For media enquiries contact APRS Director Kat Jones on 0131 225 7012