Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:32 pm on 1 October 2019.
I thank Joyce Watson, and she's quite right that we should be extremely proud of what we have achieved here in Wales. And we are very much a global leader; countries across the world are looking to us for an example of what can be done, because, of course, since devolution, our household waste recycling rate has increased from just 5.2 per cent to 61 per cent, and it's the third highest in the world. But, clearly, there's no room for complacency and we can do much more. Joyce Watson raised the importance of ensuring that businesses also play their part, and the Deputy Minister for Housing and Local Government has launched a consultation on business recycling. This will seek to see whether we can have businesses separating and recycling their waste in the same way that we already do at home.
And that issue of banning certain single-use plastics is extremely important, and the deputy Minister has also signalled that she's keen to introduce legislation to ban a number of single-use plastic items, and they include cotton bud sticks, cutlery, plates, straws, stirrers, balloon sticks and cups. I know that Joyce Watson is a big supporter of beach cleans, and many of those items will be frequent culprits, I think, when we do our beach cleans.