Deposit return scheme: Ministers ignored drinks giants by excluding glass from major new recycling project

May 29, 2023

The Government ignored industry backing for the inclusion of glass in its deposit return scheme (DRS), documents seen by i reveal.

Major drinks companies and retailers including Heineken, Britvic and Tesco as well as trade bodies such as the British Soft Drink Association and the Food and Drink Federation all backed the inclusion of glass in the scheme.

It was also supported by the Environment Agency, the Government's green regulator.

The news comes as UK ministers blocked Scotland from including glass in its own system, on the basis that it would make it incompatible with the DRS to be launched in the rest of Britain.

Ministers in London promised in January that a DRS for England, Wales and Northern Ireland would begin in October 2025, but only included plastic bottles and cans in the scheme.

They then used the recently passed United Kingdom Internal Market Act to stop Scotland including glass, despite the fact that its DRS programme was already on the brink of rolling out.

Dominic Dyer, chair of Nature 2030, an environmental campaigning group which shared the documents with i, questioned who the Government was listening to.

"If the Government are not listening to the retailers and producers, and if they are not listening to civil society then who are they taking advice from?"

"Across the four nations of the UK, the process of implementing a Deposit Return Scheme has been one of delay, deflect and blunder. DRS is a normal part of life across Europe and yet we are still floundering with implementing waste management processes that should have been in place years ago."

DRS are widespread in northern Europe, while a further dozen more countries on the Continent are either preparing or discussing deposit schemes.

Once launched in Britain, customers will pay a small deposit on each bottle or can they purchase, which can be redeemed by placing the items in a so-called reverse vending machine which will be located at retailers and waste centres.

Glass does create some additional difficulties, compared to plastic and metals, mostly relating to additional handling costs and safety issues due to glass being significantly heavier and prone to breaking.

British Glass argued that similar schemes in Europe had driven a move towards plastic, although other respondents suggested excluding glass could drive producers to switch to glass to avoid the DRS.

Humza Yousaf, the Scottish first minister, has warned that removing glass from his country's scheme risks its viability.

First Minister @HumzaYousaf has written to @RishiSunak calling for an urgent rethink on Scotland's deposit return scheme (DRS).The FM said @GOVUK demands on DRS would hit businesses based in Scotland and threaten the scheme's viability.https://t.co/WoViSPDv3K pic.twitter.com/TILc6EaL6S

Edinburgh's DRS is meant to begin in March 2024. Mr Yousaf wrote to Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, setting a deadline of last Monday for the UK government to relent, which it did not do.

Mr Yousaf had claimed it was "very difficult" to see a future for the DRS scheme in Scotland if glass was excluded. In his letter, he claimed the Government's actions "put the future of a DRS in grave danger not only in Scotland but also in the rest of the UK due to the damage to consumer and investor confidence".

Ahead of announcing England's DRS, Defra held a consultation in 2021 to which environmental groups, industry bodies and companies all contributed responses.

Defra published a number of the responses following freedom of information requests which were shared with i by Nature 2030.

Among the major companies to respond positively to the inclusion of glass were Tesco, Sainsbury's, Marks & Spencers, Pepsi Co, the spirits giant Diageo, Nestle, Britvic and Danone.

Heineken, the world's second-largest brewer, not only backed in the inclusion of glass but called for measures to keep bottles intact so that they could be directly reused by the company.

Not all the responses were positive. Opponents of having glass in the DRS included the online supermarket Ocado and the British Retail Consortium.

The former wanted a kerbside scheme, while the latter argued that the existing recycling systems were better suited to collecting glass.

A UK Government spokesperson told i: "Our approach ensures consistency across the UK, which is the best way to provide a simple and effective system for both businesses and consumers.

"Including glass in the scheme would have led to additional costs and complexity as well as increased consumer inconvenience, as glass weighs more than other materials, takes up space and creates more risks from breakages."