Baroness Redfern (Con)

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to these regulations and also declare that I am a vice-president of the LGA and a past leader of a local authority. I welcome and note this statutory instrument creating an obligation on businesses that supply household packaging and managing the packaging once it has been discarded, to enhance to environmental protection, and for producers to demonstrate how they can work with the general public so that more products can be recycled and, importantly, to make packaging environmentally sustainable and, we hope, more easily recyclable—with, inevitably, lower fees charged. Importantly, the instrument also mandates producers to make more sustainable decisions at the product design stage. That means more costs for businesses to take in, so, on the counter side, what support will His Majesty’s Government undertake to incentivise employers, helping them to increase their recycling target rates to deliver more carbon savings? Will this amendment refer to small, medium and large businesses on a sliding scale, or for any exemptions? I make a request in particular for extra support for our small businesses, as they are a lifeline in our supply chains to our economy. Another point to make is: what assessment is being designed of how the household definition could be refined to capture fewer items of packaging disposed of by businesses? How are producers to offset fees for packaging that they produce when they collect and recycle packaging themselves? In particular, the amendments allow producers to offset fees for closed-loop packaging, easier on top of the existing exemptions. How will this be truly monitored? What acceptable range of evidence must producers provide for closed-loop packaging waste, which has been recycled before fees for packaging can be offset? I look forward to the Minister’s reply.