A six-year-old boy, Harrison Forsyth, provided us with a much needed wake-up call last week. He called on the boss of Aldi to protect our oceans:

“Dear boss of Aldi, I have watched this programme called Blue Planet 2 and I have seen that the plastic in the sea is making the animals sick and die.

So please can you stop using plastic that you cannot recycle?”

Young Harrison is right to be concerned: the trapped turtles, dying birds and suffocating whales in BBC’s Blue Planet II show the damage that plastic is causing to our world. Millions of tonnes of plastics enter the oceans each year and the United Nations says that if current pollution rates continue, there will be more plastic in the sea than fish by 2050 – Harrison will be just 41 years-old.

Quick Guide Plastics and our throwaway society Show Why is plastic being demonised? Since the 1950s, 8.3bn tonnes of plastic has been produced. Plastic is seen as a versatile, indispensable product, but the environmental impact is becoming more stark. Plastic is now so pervasive that recycling systems cannot keep up and the leakage into the environment is such that by 2050 plastic in the ocean will outweigh fish. In 2017 scientists found plastic fibres in tap water, and plastic has been found in the stomachs of sea creatures in the deepest part of the ocean. Most plastic waste ends up in landfill sites or leaks into the natural environment, where it is causing huge damage to eco-systems on land and sea, creating near permanent contamination. According to academics in the United States, by 2015, of all the plastic waste generated since the 1950s, only 9% has been recycled, with 12% incinerated and 79% accumulated in landfill sites or the environment. Why are the supermarkets under fire? Producers of plastic include retailers, drinks companies and supermarkets. Supermarkets create more than half of the plastic waste in the household stream in the UK. But they refuse to reveal how much they put on to the streets and how much they pay towards recycling it. Supermarkets are under pressure to reduce their plastic packaging and campaigners argue they have the power to turn off the tap. Much of the packaging they sell to consumers is not recyclable: plastic film, black plastic trays, sleeves on drinks bottles and some coloured plastic. The Recycling Association and other experts believe supermarkets could do much more to make packaging 100% recyclable and reduce the use of plastic. Who pays to clean up the waste? The taxpayer, overwhelmingly. UK producers and retailers pay among the lowest towards recycling and dealing with their waste in Europe. In other countries, the “polluter” is forced to pay much more. In France, a sliding system of charges means those who put more non- recyclable material on the market pay more. What can shoppers do to help? Supermarkets are under pressure, not least from the prime minister, to create plastic-free aisles. A growing number of zero-waste shops are springing up and consumers are being encouraged to ask for products to be sold without plastic. Sandra Laville Photograph: ermingut/E+

Even though plastic is destroying our oceans, big corporations are being given money to produce cheap plastic. Taxpayers pay more than 90% of the cost of recycling, while huge subsidies are placed on fossil fuels, the major building block for plastic. This is unfair: we need to take bold action now.

Corporations should pay for the damage they cause. Only then will they be forced to create environmentally friendly alternatives. Fossil fuel companies received subsidies of $5.3tn (£3.7tn) worldwide in 2015, China alone provided subsidies of $2.3tn. As plastic is made out of fossil fuels, these are effectively colossal plastic subsidies.

Rather than being paid to pollute our waters, the polluters should pay for their plastic waste to be recycled. Currently that cost is covered by the taxpayer, but instead the cost of recycling should be part of the cost of the plastic itself – with the additional money being transferred to local governments to pay for recycling. The government should reward retailers who develop new sustainable ideas, and raise charges on packaging that is difficult to recycle. This would reduce the demand for deadly plastics among producers and retailers.



Michael Gove’s 25-year plan to reduce avoidable plastic waste by 2042 falls well short of the EU’s Strategy for Plastics which aims to do the same thing by 2030. We should not be lagging 12 years behind our EU neighbours. Gove claims to be “haunted” by Blue Planet, but he is bizarrely proposing leaving the plastic problem until he is 75 years old.

The government proposals fail to make manufacturers and retailers pay for the environmental and social costs of plastic. The government should change this to stop big corporations ruining our oceans.

Unrecyclable plastic has left the oceans in a critical condition. We need radical action. France is aiming to use 100% recyclable plastic by 2025, and we should aim to match them. A ban on fish-killing unrecyclable plastics should be a priority. The retailer Iceland has just promised to scrap plastic packaging on all of its own-branded products within five years; other supermarkets should be required to do the same.

The business costs of Brexit encourage companies to save money that should be invested in our environment. Last week the EU gave us a one-week ultimatum to comply with air quality laws. Our environment is at risk from Brexit so we need to make guarantees that EU environmental standards will be maintained in new trade deals outside of the EU.

We have an unconditional duty to protect the oceans for the sake of our children’s futures. If we want to save our turtles, birds and whales, we must take radical steps to tackle the plastic problem. This means incentivising business to reduce the use of plastic in favour of sustainable alternatives and banning unrecyclable plastic. If six-year-old Harrison can already see we need to take urgent action, then surely the time has come for brave and bold leadership to save our oceans.