My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for introducing the amended regulations. On the face of it they appear to make sense. Certainly, the changes to the approving bodies, the extended sign-off arrangements and the one-stop shop for the devolved nations are broadly welcomed and have clearly received considerable support during the consultation. It seems that the claims of savings that will be made by these changes are slightly overegged, but I take the point that there is an established way of calculating such savings and I am not going to quibble about the methodology at this point. That is a matter for another day.
I have two main questions arising from the proposals. First, they remove the requirement to produce an operational plan, as the noble Baroness outlined. I appreciate that the current requirements may be unwieldy and overdetailed, but is it not probable that removing the operational plans altogether also removes a major discipline and pressure on packaging producers to comply with their obligations under the EU directive?
We all acknowledge, as did the noble Baroness, that the priority is to increase our rates of packaging recycling, so how does the complete removal of the operational plan help that? Might we not be better off replacing it with a simplified format that achieves the same objectives? How will its complete removal impact on the monitoring of performance and compliance of individual companies? The noble Baroness referred to that, but perhaps she will enunciate it a little further. Also, would we not be wiser to delay the changes to these regulations so that we can take account of the proposed extension of producer responsibility schemes in the Commission’s new circular economy package which relates to these measures?
Secondly, what more is being done to ensure that producers cover the full cost of processing their packaging waste? As I understand it, unlike the rest of Europe, in the UK, the producers’ fees cover only about 10% of their waste costs. As a result, a disproportionate cost for collecting and recycling falls on local authorities. This, in turn, means that much of the cost is met by taxpayers rather than the product manufacturers. This goes against the principles of producer responsibility as originally envisaged by the EU. What more are the Government doing to ensure that the costs fall where they belong: at the door of the manufacturers? What further pressures can we bring to bear to encourage excess and unnecessary packaging to be designed out before goods hit the marketplace in the first place?
This is a policy area where we cannot afford to be complacent, because we still have some way to go before we meet our EU targets. Therefore, it would be helpful if the Minister could make it clear what new levers will be introduced to drive up compliance and
innovation in the sector. I realise that these latter points are slightly wide of the content of the new drafts before us today. Nevertheless, they are important and I look forward to her response.