The Plastic Bag Ban, 6 months on.

So what difference has it made?

For the last couple of months, I have been travelling and checking out caravan parks.  The garbage bins used to be cleanly filled with plastic bags that nicely contained all the nastier and messier type rubbish.  Now, it seems to be half and half loose rubbish and contained rubbish.  (Obviously a lot of people still have their plastic bags and are still using them.)

There tends to be signs on the bins - 'Please bag your rubbish.'   Obviously it is easier and less unpleasant work when rubbish is bagged.

We were inside our van at one place - (Coolamon)  when a willy willy picked up two rubbish bins,  rolled them over and over, and tossed around the rubbish.  Luckily, it happened that the rubbish in those bins had been all neatly enclosed in plastic bags,  quick and easy and clean to pick up and toss back in the bin when the willy willy had moved on.
(A willy willy is a mini-whirlwind. The poor Germans next to us had not seen such a thing before, and were thoroughly alarmed.)




What other differences has it made?

Myself - I do a lot less impulse buying these days.  I buy less from places who do not supply a bag,  and none from dress shops who want to charge. I resent that what used to be free now costs roughly 1000 times of its cost of manufacture.

The back of my car is now messy with bags waiting for use.  That is an irritation.

Is there more or less littering?
It's about the same, as far as I can see. Plastic bags never were a major litter item.  There have always been far more cigarette packs and fast food boxes left lying around

And there is inconvenience.  Only the other day, I heard a women at the supermarket complaining that she can never remember to bring bags.  I guess she bought new ones.  And I guess more and more people are buying more and more new plastic bags, but firmer plastic, bigger, and not as useful as the older, smaller ones that could be folded small when needed, and sealed off with a tie. Try doing that with the 'Recyclable' variety.

And I notice that the checkout staff have started routinely asking if a customer wishes to buy a bag, I guess, like, 'Would you like fries with that?  Are they not making enough money from plastic bag sales then?  Surely it was not, after all, about extra profits!  I had thought it was about appearing to care for the environment.  (Not actually caring for the environment, of course, just appearing to care for the environment.)
 I wonder how the pie graph would look for the reason for this pestiferous policy.

Something like this? 

Or is it little to do with anything like this?  Maybe it was just political wheeling and dealing - that sense was cast aside in exchange for someone's vote on something else entirely. 

Are there more flies now since there are more places for them to breed?   We did see a lot of flies in our travels, but mostly only small bush flies.  It is hard to say whether there were more.

Hygiene at the Checkout:   Dust and germs inside a re-used plastic bag is the customer's concern, but how do the checkout workers like touching numerous increasingly dirty bags as the weeks go on and bags are re-used again and again?  They are worked too hard to slip off to wash hands several times in an hour.

Quarantine. Australia, as it should be, is concerned with limiting the spread of disease, especially fruit fly. But if old fruit is tossed loose in garbage bins, will pests and diseases spread more quickly?  I guess it will take a few more years to find out, and then, of course, how would you sort out this one cause from other causes such as carelessness when importing fruit and other foods?

*** Headlines today, 8th December, 2018. .  South Australia has fruit fly outbreak in the Riverland area.  Now SA was supposed to be fruit fly free, and there are large fines for taking fruit into the state.  Did the lack of plastic bags have anything to do with this outbreak?  It is the first time that I can remember such a headline.  Probably not, but who knows?  

Garden pests:  The TV show 'Gardening Australia.'  The advice was to not put diseased or pest-affected vegetation in the compost, but to enclose it in a plastic bag and then dispose of it in the garbage bin.

A plastic bag!  If we listen to the environmental police,
a sheet of newspaper will do all of the jobs that a plastic bag used to do.  What a laugh! 

___________

They call them 'single use' plastic bags, those ones that were issued free.  Of course, they never were single use.

As a matter of interest, I started keeping a diary of uses of 'single use' plastic bags.

Monday:  In this week I was holidaying at the beach, accommodation, our caravan.

1. A plastic bag was used to contain sandy thongs.  (The 'thongs' are flip flops for those who are thinking of a different sort of 'thong.')

2.  Bin liner. Our caravan bin is a small one, and these little plastic bags are the right size and have the big advantage that they can be easily tied off to contain the rubbish, especially when some will smell after a few days.

Tuesday: 

1. Two taken for shopping.

2. I purchased two fragile ornaments. They were carefully wrapped in newspaper, and then put in a plastic bag for safety. They will stay there, safely wrapped and in a bag until I am home. 

3. Bin liner.

Wednesday:

1. When doing the wash, a plastic bag was used to hold some wet clothing.

2. A sardine can smells horrible, so it was put inside a plastic bag, which was then sealed off before being put in the garbage. 

3. Bin liner

Thursday:

Early morning beach.
The crabs have done their house cleaning.

1. I stuffed a plastic bag in my pocket ready to hold any sea-shells I might pick up.

2. We bought a couple of fast food packs for lunch. A plastic bag made it easier to carry them without dropping. 

3. There were leftovers. I used a plastic bag to keep the food fresh for later use. (It would have otherwise dried out.)

4. A small amount of leftover food stank of onions. A plastic bag sealed off the odour, and it was then put in the rubbish.

5. Bin liner

Friday:

1. A plastic bag was used to hold three books when I visited the Book Exchange.

2. Bin liner

Saturday:

Bin liner

Sunday:

1. We returned home on Sunday, and a larger than usual plastic bag was used repeatedly for unpacking food and other things from the van.

Monday:

1. Used for washing

2. Used for unpacking the van

Tuesday:

1. Used to hold a drink bottle when I went to the movies. (One does not want it leaking.)

2. Used to hold a jacket in case it was cold when I went to the movies.

3. Used to pick up some bread, as the bakers no longer offer them free, and the plastic that a loaf comes wrapped is too flimsy for safety - truly single use.

And that was nine days of re-using 'single use' plastic bags.  Now they are no longer being regularly and automatically replenished, people are going to start either buying them, or running out, leading to a smellier and a messier world. 

Postscript March, 2019

At the supermarket yesterday, I noted that there were far more plastic bags for sale, colourful rolls of the type of plastic bag that can be folded or rolled into very small, and can be tied off when filled with nasty stuff.  In other words, 'single use' plastic bags that used to be handed out for free.

So what has the ban achieved?  More profit for the supermarkets, and we are likely to find ourselves using a purple or yellow bag instead of a grey one.  Wow!

Postscript April, 2019

A chap at the checkout, trolley full of groceries, said casually, 'Whatever plastic bags are needed.'  So how many customers are now simply paying for the bags at 15c each, and accepting the small extra amount as part of grocery shopping?

Another postscript:  April, 2020.  We are now in the grip of a raging pandemic.  How much cross infection occurred with reused plastic bags.  In some areas, the old type of thin plastic bag, always free, has made a return.  In other areas, maybe because authorities are reluctant to admit their mistake, and instead, customers have to pack their own bags.