Can’t wait till the unintentional and unplanned consequences kick in
Ottawa announces plans to ban single-use plastics starting in 2021 at the earliest
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says his government will ban single-use plastics — which could include bags, straws and cutlery — in Canada in 2021 at the earliest.
“We need to cover all of Canada with this decision and that’s why the federal government is moving forward on a science-based approach to establishing which harmful single-use plastics we will be eliminating as of 2021,” said Trudeau during a stop Monday at the Gault Nature Reserve in Mont St-Hilaire, just outside Montreal.
A full list of banned items isn’t set in stone, but a government source told CBC News that the list also could include items like cotton swabs, drink stirrers, plates and balloon sticks. Fast-food containers and cups made of expanded polystyrene, which is similar to white Styrofoam, will also be banned, said the source.
Trudeau said the government will research the question of which items it should ban and follow the model chosen by the European Union, which voted in March to ban plastic items for which market alternatives exist — such as single-use plastic cutlery and plates — and items made of oxo-degradable plastics, such as bags. (Oxo-degradable plastics aren’t really biodegradable; they contain additives that cause the plastic to fragment without breaking down chemically.)
The devil is in the details, so, we’ll have to wait to see how this all shakes out. I wonder, though, will Canada ban the importation of these items via international shippers, such as Amazon? How about Canadians who cross the border into the U.S. to purchase the items? Will it be against the law to bring them back? How will people get their coffee and fast food? What will it be served in? And how much will this increase costs?
He also revealed plans to make companies that manufacture or sell plastic products to take responsibility for recycling their plastic waste.
“Whether we’re talking about plastic bottles or cellphones, it will be up to businesses to take responsibility for the plastics they’re manufacturing and putting out into the world,” said Trudeau.
Or, they could just stop selling their products in Canada, leaving them with no smartphones, causing a mental breakdown in people who are hooked.
Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer said the plan lacks any details about how it would affect the economy.
“In the dying days of this government — with a scandal-plagued government, with a prime minister desperate to change the channel — we see another gesture without a plan without any kind of specifics about how this would be implemented or any kind of study on the impact on prices for consumers, on jobs, on how this would affect small businesses,” he told reporters in Ottawa
“This is clearly just a government clutching at straws.”
I’m sure the pun was intended.
