Group 8: Prohibited single-use plastic products: power to amend (Amendments 18, 19, 21, 23)

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:28 pm on 6 December 2022.

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Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 5:28, 6 December 2022

Diolch, Llywydd. I will address amendments 18, 19 and 21 together. Firstly, just to thank Janet Finch-Saunders for agreeing to collaborate on these three amendments. Taken together, they would revise the reporting requirements in section 4 of the Bill, so Welsh Ministers would need to report not only on any considerations they make about prohibiting single-use plastic wet wipes or sauce sachets, but also about any proposed use of their section 3 powers. This applies whether they propose to ban further products, to remove a ban, or to add, remove or amend exemptions to bans. Wet wipes and sauce sachets were amongst the products that respondents to our consultation suggested should be banned or restricted. Therefore, I am pleased to see them highlighted in the Bill. I must remind Members, however, that product labelling is not devolved to Wales, so we will be working with the UK Government to address the need for wet wipes to be labelled with their plastic content. At present, it is not possible for consumers to look at packaging and tell whether the wet wipes include some element of plastic in them or not.

Amendment 23 would require Welsh Ministers to report on the number of prosecutions brought under section 5 of the Bill, and the number of persons found guilty of the offence. I do recognise that the intention of this amendment is to monitor the enforcement element of the Bill. However, I believe this approach will create an unnecessary administrative and reporting burden on Government and local authorities. The primary intention of this Bill, Llywydd, is not to criminalise people but to drive behavioural change. Prosecutions are very much a sanction of last resort. We have already committed to undertaking an implementation review of the Bill, and I anticipate that enforcement will be considered as part of this work. As such, I do not believe that there is any need for a separate requirement. I therefore support amendments 18, 19 and 21 and recommend that Members do the same, but, for the reasons I've just said, reject amendment 23. Diolch.