Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what discussions he has had with industry on raising the level of recycled materials in packaging recovery notes.

The Government has committed in our 25 Year Environment Plan and Clean Growth Strategy to reforming our producer responsibility systems (including the packaging waste regulations) to incentivise producers to take greater responsibility for the environmental impacts of their products. This will look at all aspects of the packaging producer responsibility regime, including mechanisms to incentivise better design and encourage the greater use of recycled material, as well as the funding of collections within the system.

The Secretary of State has had discussions with the Waste & Resources Action Programme, the Industry Council for Packaging & the Environment and the Advisory Committee on Packaging as representatives of industry to hear their views on reforming the packaging producer responsibility system, including incentivising the use of recycled content.