Letters: No time to waste for NI to develop a litter strategy

The recent strike action from councils focused attention on Northern Ireland’s waste problem in the most sensory way possible.

The odour, swarms of flies and visual unpleasantness of piles of household and business rubbish in the streets laid bare an issue that is, for many ratepayers, an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ issue. Our rubbish problem has been lingering like a bad smell for years and the current attention on waste management is a welcome opportunity for reflection.

The households and businesses inconvenienced by strikes will hopefully now have realised that part of the problem is the volume of unnecessary waste we are producing. It’s hard to believe, but the plastic bag we have come to know and loathe was only invented in 1965. The convenience of disposable nappies, pre-packaged snacks, plastic bags, takeout coffee cups and lids etc are a feature of our modern world; used once and then thrown away. These single-use plastics come with obvious consequences for the public purse, human health, and our precious environment. It’s my hope that ratepayers across Northern Ireland now consider the scale of what we’re up against. Waste is everyone’s problem, but it’s also everyone’s responsibility.

Household waste is just one facet of the problem – litter too is an increasingly alarming issue, with single use plastics again a recurring culprit. Our annual Cleaner Neighbourhoods Report, rarely a promising read, shows a continuing problem with cleanliness. Drinks related litter is prevalent in all surveyed areas. Rural roads are particularly blighted, with 90 per cent of those surveyed featuring items of tossed-aside drinks packaging. And whilst easy to blame ‘litter louts’, it’s clear that the problem is wider than that, and that large packaging producers continue to avoid the cost of the clean-up.

The world’s plastics producers operate hand-in-glove with the fossil fuel industry, generally either owning or being owned by oil and gas companies. Big oil is facing a reckoning with a series of lawsuits filed by cities and states across the US for alleged coverups of their knowledge of climate change. Similar proceedings are expected against plastic producers and governments in the wake of the UN’s resolution on plastics. One wonders if this lack of corporate responsibility is a crime against humanity.

But what can we do about these global problems at local level? Well, Northern Ireland urgently needs a litter strategy and a collaborative approach from legislative decision makers, businesses and communities. Keep Northern Ireland Beautiful is rolling out public awareness campaigns and building relationships with local councils, but we need more support.

I’d like Northern Ireland to invest and incentivise the circular economy - sharing, leasing, reusing, repairing, refurbishing and recycling – to produce less waste in the first place. There’s inspiring work going on at local level; refill schemes show how people can be rewarded for doing good with lots of businesses rewarding people with a small discount for using a reusable cup or free water stations provided in public places. There are cloth nappy libraries, zero-waste shops, and Teracycle hubs too. These pioneering initiatives need to be supported so that they become standard practice.

Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme will go live next year and shows how easy it is to the do the right thing. People will pay a deposit of 20 pence when they buy a drink in a single-use container and get it back when the empty is returned. Incoming legislation will also put more responsibility on producers, and we support this shift.

With leadership, circularity can start to become a reality. It’s a well-used phrase; but there’s no time to waste.

Ian Humphreys, Chief Executive, Keep Northern Ireland Beautiful