Plastic Pollution

Lord Kamall Excerpts

Monday 15th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

We talk regularly to supermarkets and other retailers, plus organisations that actually package the goods in the first place. We need to reduce the amount of damaging packaging that goes into our environment because, as I have said before, recycling is great—we encourage it—but it is better if do not need it in the first place or if we can reduce the need for recycling. The noble Baroness is absolutely right: Christmas chocolate boxes are a good example of overpackaging, but Easter eggs are another. We need to work with the industry to reduce this packaging in the first place.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

My Lords, when countries fail to reach a global agreement, often you find a coalition of the willing who will sign a plurilateral agreement and perhaps allow other countries to join later. Have the Government thought about signing a plurilateral treaty or agreement on the use of plastics, which other countries can join later?

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

Our ambition at the moment is to try to get the global treaty that we have been pressing for. We believe that the more countries that we can bring into that treaty, including those that produce the plastics and the materials for them, the more likely we are to have a larger global impact. But we are considering all options, because we need to move forward in this space.