Industry, the recycling sector, environmental groups and the Australian Greens are today uniting in calls for a mandatory federal extended producer responsibility (EPR) scheme, ahead of a meeting of federal, state and territory environment ministers this Friday.
The Labor Government has previously committed to reforming Australia’s packaging system through an EPR scheme that would make producers responsible for the end-of-life impacts of the packaging they put into the market, but has since walked back that commitment.
Representatives from industry, the recycling sector, environmental groups, the Greens and crossbench are calling on Labor to deliver a mandatory national scheme that puts responsibility where it belongs: on the companies that design, produce and profit from packaging.
Australia’s existing voluntary approach has comprehensively failed. The National Packaging Targets were supposed to deliver 100 per cent reusable, recyclable or compostable packaging and 70 per cent plastic packaging recycling by 2025. We are nowhere near those targets.
The Greens have previously introduced legislation that would establish a national EPR scheme for packaging and make Australia’s National Packaging Targets mandatory and legally binding.
Australian Greens spokesperson for Waste and Recycling, Senator Steph Hodgins-May, said there was now broad agreement that Australia’s voluntary approach was not working:
“We don’t always see eye to eye on everything, but industry, environmental groups and the Greens are united on this. Australia needs a mandatory federal packaging scheme.
“The environmental ministers’ meeting is a chance for federal Labor to stop kicking this can down the road and finally make the companies producing the waste responsible for fixing it.
“We’ve spent years setting voluntary targets, and we’ve fallen embarrassingly short. The voluntary approach has failed, and Australia is leading the world in plastic waste for all the wrong reasons.”
“Industry, environmental groups and the crossbench are calling for mandatory action and the certainty that comes with a nationally regulated scheme, so there are no more excuses for delay.
“Plastic waste is clogging our environment and our landfills, and it is now even turning up in our bodies. Labor cannot keep pretending this is a problem to be fixed with a patchwork of separate regulations.
“Successive governments have put the burden on households and councils while the companies producing and profiting from packaging walk away from the mess.
“If you make the packaging, you should be responsible for what happens to it.
“Labor’s cost-of-living excuse doesn’t stack up. Australians are already paying for this broken system through their council rates and waste charges. Making producers responsible would mean less of the cost is dumped on households and councils.
“Labor’s own consultation found 65 per cent support for mandatory extended producer responsibility. The evidence is overwhelming but what’s missing is political will.
“Industry wants certainty. Environmental groups want action. Australians want less waste and a recycling system that actually works.
“We’re ready to work with Labor to get it done this term.”
