4. What is the Welsh Government doing to reduce the use of plastic in Wales? OAQ51811

Apologies.

It's written down. 

What is the Welsh Government doing to reduce the use of plastic in Wales?

Apologies for that. The Welsh Government ensured that Wales was at the forefront of introducing the charge on single-use carrier bags. Since its introduction, there has been a substantial reduction in single-use plastic carrier bag usage. We are now developing legislation to introduce a microbeads ban in Wales, on both the manufacture and sale of those products. 

Thank you very much for that response. I was very pleased to attend an event at Rhosneigr last Friday evening where a new campaign was launched to turn Anglesey into a plastic-free island. What that does is appeal to people—individuals, businesses and councils—to cease the use of plastics in many areas. There is a motion about to go before Anglesey County Council so that the whole council can take a stance on this. Does the Government support this kind of campaign to reduce the amount of plastic in our environment? Will the leader of the house also agree that we need governmental leadership and legislative leadership from this Assembly too in order to ensure that there is all-Wales action to reduce the use of plastics and plastics in our environment?

Yes, indeed, I very much welcome Anglesey's bid for Anglesey to become Wales's first local authority to have official plastic-free status. I think it includes plans to establish a water refill network across the island, and we'd be very interested to see how that goes. The Member will be well aware that 2018 is Wales's Year of the Sea, so it's very timely to act to protect our natural assets by taking further action of this sort. We set up the Wales clean seas partnership and working group to look at these issues and to focus action on preventing the problem at source.

The Minister for Environment was pleased to offer her personal congratulations to the Plastic Free Newquay campaigners in Newquay last week, when they were officially awarded plastic-free status. It's really pleasing to see Welsh communities taking positive action on the issue. Newquay joins its neighbour, Aberporth, as official plastic-free communities, and we very much hope that other towns and villages across Wales will follow suit. It's great to see Anglesey local authority taking that initiative.

As I said in the initial answer, we are developing legislation to introduce the microbeads ban in Wales on both the manufacture and sale of products—by 30 June 2018, we hope. Llantwit Major recently became the first town in Wales to sign up to the Refill app, which encourages people to refill water bottles at shops, cafes and businesses, so we'd like to encourage that sort of thing as well. But we very much welcome it and we're very much actively looking to see what we can do, both legislatively and culturally, to help people reduce their use of plastics.  

Leader of the house, last September the Cabinet Secretary for Energy, Planning and Rural Affairs announced that she'd commissioned a study that would be looking at ways to, and I quote,

'increase waste prevention, increase recycling and reduce land and marine based litter.'

The study would also be including research on the impacts of extended producer responsibility schemes. Leader of the house, can I ask: when can we expect the findings of that report to be made available? 

We've commissioned consultants to conduct a study to examine the potential for extended producer responsibility approaches in Wales, which will help increase recycling and reduce the littering of packaging. I think the research will be focusing on food and drink-related packaging, including plastic bottles and cans, and will also include an analysis of a potential deposit-return scheme. The Minister for environment is, in fact, making a statement on recycling in Wales later on in today's agenda. I just think it's worth pointing out that Wales has the highest municipal recycling rate in the UK, the second highest in Europe and the third highest in in the world. So, we're doing very well already, but the Member is quite right—we could do more, and we will be looking to see what we can do. 

Leader of the house, I'm sure you'll welcome the decision by the BBC to eliminate by 2020 all single-use plastics from their premises, and the royal family, which is an institution nearly as grand and august as the BBC, has said that internal caterers at Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle and the Palace of Holyrood will have to use china plates and glasses, or recyclable—[Interruption.]—recyclable paper cups. I just wonder if the Welsh Government is going to follow the royal family and the BBC's example and do the same on its premises. 

I think it's a very laudable aim. I'm not too sure about china ones, but I know that David Melding has heard me on one of my many soapboxes on a number of occasions about my antipathy towards single-use coffee cups, and my carrying around, to the detriment of the inside of my handbag on occasions, coffee cups that can be refilled. Indeed, I'm very pleased that the Assembly estate largely uses china cups as well, but we have a little issue with the lids, I think. 

It's surprisingly hard to eliminate plastic from your life. I've had a go at it myself, and there are some products that are very, very difficult to get hold of without plastic, so there is a big issue about us working with the UK Government to ensure that we put some pressure on manufacturers to come up with alternatives. There are lots of things we can do in the meantime, though, and I will certainly be taking up his suggestion on the Welsh Government estate to see what we can do to reduce what we currently have in terms of single-use plastic. And, if the Llywydd will indulge me for one minute, I will repeat something I've already said in this Chamber, which is that I would thoroughly encourage everybody to be using bamboo-handled toothbrushes, which are an excellent substitute for single-use plastic toothbrushes.