Plastic

I'm definitely becoming a bit obsessive about this. DH is getting a bit fed up me exclaiming and THIS is plastic too. We had a small trifle and Creme caramel for pud at lunchtime-well we can't buy those in any other container can we? Would love to be able to exert some pressure on supermarkets to cut out plastic wrapping and insist on paper bags.

I saw that too, Newquay and I was so saddened by it. You would think that there, at least, would be a pristine environment!

www.change.org/p/un-secretary-general-antónio-guterres-accept-the-trash-isles-as-an-official-country-help-protect-our-oceans

If it is made a country it’ll have value and it can be mined!

And now they've just on the news that they've found plastic in the Mariana Trench for goodness sake! So it's everywhere and indestructible! I'm so conscious of it now. . . .

My mother always saved the paper bags and carriers to use again. I had no idea you could buy greaseproof paper or brown paper till I was in my 30s! We used the wax paper from cereals and any brown paper from parcels or packages. I still save them and padded envelopes which can be re-used with a sheet of paper over the address!! My sons still mock me for folding and saving birthday and Christmas wrapping paper. I have recycled for ever!

OK those are not plastic but I also save ice cream cartons, great for storing small toys etc and for lunch boxes and picnics. Plastic containers from eg cole slaw make good drip trays for plant pots. I re-use plastic water bottles (yes I've read all the warnings) but I empty them and put fresh water in each time). Large clear plastic bags are used for storing clothes , bedding etc and the smaller zip top ones are good for jigsaw pieces (I make sure there are small holes in them if used by the children). Bubble wrap is used for packing though those ones with great big bubbles I find very therapeutic just to pop!! Stabbing them with a knife may well have saved lives when I am angry with someone!!

I had a delivery from M&S today. Two jumpers, each on their plastic hangers, inside a plastic cover. Then both plastic wrapped jumpers put inside a plastic envelope for delivery. Had I bought them in the store (I couldn't, they were out of stock), they would not have been supplied in plastic covers and I really don't see the need for them. It's this kind of over-packaging that frustrates me.

Sorry Bluebell, I went a bit off piste!

Ha, Bathsheba I'm just about at the end of a massive pack of plastic straws I probably bought circa 1995!

What brought me up short wrt plastic was reading on the BBC that almost all plastic that has ever been made still exists. All those straws, all the plastic toothbrushes ever manufactured, the broken toys, Biros, anything plastic, is still around, whether it's in our home or in landfill.

I take egg cartons to the village shop which sells local farm eggs.

All my fruit, veg, and salad stuff are loose in the market and put into paper bags if necessary. I line cake tins with butter papers and compost newspapers and egg cartons.
I dislike plastic so use an enamel washing up bowl, enamel kettle on the hob. Plastic carrier bags are reused as bin liners.
What I can’t cut down is the over-packaging on supermarket items. My kitchen bin is full of the plastic which is used to protect in transit or to keep food clean.

Nlkdumplind
i d hate to return to newspaper squares in the loo
Did you use to use plastic toilet paper then ??

The reasoning is that paper bags disintegrate when rained on and stores don't want to give out paper ones which will then be buried inside another bag so their advertising won't show.

Why can't we just have paper carrier bags . I do try and take my own bags but occasionally forget . What I dislike the most is if I'm out and decide to buy an item of clothing ,that the bags all seem to be plastic !

In Italy, the State are bringing in a 5 cent tax on those flimsy plastic bags used to weigh our fruit and veg and stick the price tag on. Supermarkets will get none of this and will be fined heavily if they try to sidestep it. I don't think the government is so concerned about reducing plastic pollution - just about how to get more money without LOOKING as though they are raising taxes!!!.

Our fruit and veg shop sells loose and will pop it straight into your bag. Perhaps the law depends on what sort of shop it is?

Oh yes Bathsheba those plastic rings are lethal. If ever I have/find them I seem to spend ages cutting them up so nothing can get caught in them.

My DH brought me half a cucumber this morning. It was wrapped in that plastic cover, and then in a plastic outer wrapper. Surely there is no need for two wrappers. I asked him if he couldn't buy an unwrapped cucumber, but his answer was no. It's wrapped for heath and safety reasons. I can wash vegetables, it's not difficult!
When I was a child, a local market gardener sold fruit and vegetables from a trailer on the back of his tractor. Everything was loose and you took your own bag or bowl to carry the produce in. We didn't have far to go as he parked right outside out house.

And those plastic wraps are some of the worst things possible if they end up with wildlife being caught up in them.

Sorry, forgot to close the speech marks after 98p.

I bought a 4 pack of Asda baked beans this afternoon. When I was unpacking the shopping I thought about this thread - the four tins were held together with plastic wrap. You know the sort of thing, they do it with all these multi buys nowadays. But why? A single tin is 30p. A pack of 4 is 98p. Can they not simply have signage which reads "buy four tins for only 98p, and have the tills do the 22p deduction? They can do it for BOGOFs and for meal deals, so it is clear that the tills can be programmed to do this. The bottom line is there is absolutely no reason on earth for that plastic wrap.

Thank you NFK

Thanks for that tip, SueDonim, I shall certainly investigate mesh bags.

As for the straws, I've still got a handful of plastic ones that I've had since my eldest GC was little - whatever I do with them, they will end up in the bin at some point, so I may as well just use them up. And then I will get some paper ones, if I feel the need to buy any more.

I've just ordered paper straws for home use, Bathsheba. £4.99 for 150 on Amazon. They're not as cheap as plastic but we don't use many and, as they say, every little helps.

I don't put loose veg into poly bags at the supermarket. I just dump them in the trolley as they are or I use mesh bags. GN won't let me post a link to them but just Google mesh produce bags and they should come up.

Meant to say too - there are proposals to ban single use plastic straws in bars throughout Cornwall. If the campaign succeeds, it will be the first county to impose such a ban.

I remember cereal packets had greaseproof paper liners, not the plastic ones of today. My MiL always saved them neatly and wrapped her sandwiches in them. She too would wash out poly bags and reuse them. There is far too much single use plastic around. The 5p carrier bag charge has helped - I for one never use the single use bags anymore - but I don't think it went far enough. I believe those single use carriers should have been banned altogether. And do we really need to put our 3 or 4 carrots into a poly bag at the supermarket?