Draft Environmental Protection (Wet Wipes Containing Plastic) (England) Regulations 2025

Stella Creasy Excerpts

Monday 3rd November 2025 General Committees

[Dame Angela Eagle]

We have had a small but perfectly formed debate on a measure that has gathered cross-party agreement, partly because of the power of the argument about the damage that microplastics do. I particularly compliment my hon. Friend the Member for Putney on her long-standing and very powerful advocacy in this area: she should be very proud of the effect that her campaigning has had.

The hon. Member for Richmond Park has sold the beauty of her constituency in a way that I have never quite managed. I look forward to a time when she can talk about the unalloyed pleasures of the nature and beauty of her constituency without having to get us all involved in contemplating 180 tonnes of fatberg caused by 5 million wet wipes, but I also observe that 11 million wet wipes, or possibly more, are used a year. That is two fatbergs a year, created by the kind of waste that we are talking about banning.

I acknowledge that, as the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex pointed out, banning wet wipes that contain plastic will not stop the formation of fatbergs in our sewer system, because any wet wipe can contribute to that, as indeed can pouring oil down the sewer system. We therefore have much more work to do, not least on labelling and the “Do not flush” approach to the wet wipes that will remain even after the ban is brought into force. I compliment the hon. Gentleman for pointing out to me some of the issues with the Department, which I joined not so long ago; I will take those back so that future statutory instruments can get through his Committee unscathed. I note the points that he made about those that have not quite reached the standard of technical excellence of this one.

The hon. Gentleman asked whether we would have been able to introduce this statutory instrument if we had been in the EU. My information is that we would. The EU is not actually banning wet wipes at the moment; it is doing plastic versus non-plastic labelling. Perhaps the EU is beginning to go down the path that we have pioneered.

[Ms Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

In a minute.

[Dame Angela Eagle]

Of course, and that is why I will give way to my hon. Friend. I think that the EU is perhaps beginning some tentative steps along the same pathway that, thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Putney, we are pioneering.

[Ms Creasy]

I know that the Minister, like me, will want to reassure the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex, who has previously expressed grave concern that somehow working with our European counterparts would not help us to abolish taxes on tampons, for example. Let me reassure him that the single-use plastics directive, which was made in 2019—after we voted to leave the European Union, admittedly, but before we left—would facilitate this work. Indeed, the Netherlands and Spain are already progressing their own bans. The European Union is—as it always was—simply a springboard to making decisions at a local level. We are ahead of the curve here in the United Kingdom, but working with the European Union would not prevent us from doing this work. I am sure that that will entirely reassure the hon. Member.

[Dame Angela Eagle]

I am in awe of my hon. Friend’s detailed knowledge of EU directives that were passed after we left. I am sure that she remains in dynamic alignment with what is going on in Europe.

I want to spend a little time answering the questions of the hon. Member for Epping Forest. Enforcement will be proportionate. The 18-month transition period is pretty generous, as far as transition periods go. We are certainly hoping that with the signals that have been given and with the ban coming in, the industry will be able to adjust. We also encourage it to innovate so that we can get plastic out of the remaining wet wipes that, for the time being, the exemptions in the statutory instrument allow. It is a pragmatic statutory instrument, as the hon. Gentleman says.

The hon. Gentleman asked how enforcement would work. It will be on sellers and suppliers, not on individuals. There will certainly be no one knocking on doors and checking people’s pantries to see whether they have an old supply of wet wipes with plastic in. At least, that is not the Government’s intention; if anyone were on the receiving end of that treatment, it would certainly be an overreach not allowed under this statutory instrument. With all those qualifications, I hope that the Committee will agree to the draft regulations.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the Committee has considered the draft Environmental Protection (Wet Wipes Containing Plastic) (England) Regulations 2025.