The Scottish Government’s Deposit Return Scheme has been in the news a lot recently, but it can be tricky to decipher what’s going on with it from all the talk about the Internal Markets Act, Circularity Scotland, and votes of no confidence.
The idea of deposit return was first written into the Climate Change Act in 2009, and over a decade later, the scheme’s launch was delayed due to Covid and pushed back to August this year. Design and delivery of the deposit return scheme has been managed from the start by industry – big companies such as supermarkets and drinks manufacturers who are the main producers of plastic bottles and cans.
Earlier this year, the scheme was delayed again until 2024 to allow time for small business concerns to be ironed out, and then the UK Government used its Internal Markets Act to get involved and make the scheme align with their own plans, delaying it again to 2025.
The principle of the deposit return scheme is that the polluters should pay for the cost of cleaning up the waste caused by their products. Until now, Local Authorities have been spending huge amounts from the public purse to clean up litter, much of which is plastic bottles and cans. By paying a 20p deposit on bottles and cans, which is refunded when the bottle is returned to a return point, people are incentivised to recycle. In other countries, schemes like this have increased recycling rates to 90% (in Scotland our recycling rates are around 40%).
Big businesses like supermarkets and drinks manufacturers are obliged to pay a fee to a company called Circularity Scotland, which has been set up by the industry to manage the deposit return scheme. Any place that sells plastic bottles or cans will have to also become a returns point, from which the bottles and cans will be collected by a contractor and taken to a central point to be processed. The idea of using small businesses as returns points is that there will always be one close by, even in rural areas like Argyll & Bute.
Because of the multiple delays to the deposit returns scheme, Circularity Scotland has been forced into administration and will have to reopen when the scheme is ready to start again.
A functioning Deposit Return Scheme could revolutionise the way we recycle and use plastic, in the same way that the carrier bag charge immediately cut the use of single use shopping bags. It already works in many countries in Europe and across the world, it just needs to get up and running here.
If you are interested in learning more about the Deposit Return Scheme, you can watch the recording of a talk we recently hosted on the topic here:
Here are some resources for further reading.
Friends of the Earth Scotland briefing on deposit return (slightly out of date now but still has some useful information about the basics):
https://foe.scot/resource/briefing-paper-on-scotlands-deposit-return-scheme/
Scottish Government position on the Internal market Act
https://www.gov.scot/publications/brexit-uk-internal-market-act-devolution/pages/5/
A recent blog post by transparency International on industry lobby around deposit return in the UK:
Friends of the earth Scotland online resources for getting involved in the Circular Economy Bill, which has recently been introduced to the Scottish parliament:
https://foe.scot/resource/circular-economy-organisers-pack/
The first resource in this list is for a booklet which explains why the Circular Economy Bill is important for creating a sustainable future for Scotland and has ideas on how to get involved.
Reloop Deposit Guide:
https://www.reloopplatform.org/global-deposit-book-2022/
July 2023