Businesses continue to cry foul over scheme’s design ahead of the deadline for submitting the latest tranche of packaging data. By Nick Hughes.
The deadline for businesses to register and report their latest set of packaging data passed yesterday (April 1st) amid ongoing discord over the design and impact of the UK Government’s extended producer responsibility scheme for packaging (pEPR).
Last week, a number of pub and restaurant groups made a last ditch effort to persuade ministers to exempt packaging supplied to hospitality businesses from the scope of the regulation.
Businesses including Azzurri Group, Burger King UK, Fuller’s and Marston’s signed a letter to Defra secretary of state Steve Reed suggesting poor policy design meant that bottles of beer and wine are being incorrectly classified as household waste and subject to the packaging levy, despite not ever leaving the hospitality premises. They said fees charged to suppliers are now being passed directly onto hospitality venues, who are already paying to recycle the products commercially – meaning they are effectively being double-charged.
“The logic appears to be that a bottle of beer or wine could be served to the customer and end up in the household waste system,” read the letter. “This is not the reality for the vast majority of hospitality businesses that collect any packaging served to their customers.”
The much delayed pEPR regulation places responsibility on businesses who use and supply packaging (obligated producers) for the full cost of managing it once it reaches its ‘end of life’. It is estimated that revenue from the fees will generate more than £1bn annually to support local collection and disposal services, including recycling services.
To-date, in-scope businesses have been required to report data on their packaging to the scheme administrator, which in turn is being used to inform fees for the scheme. Footprint has previously reported that many companies failed to meet last year’s submission deadline. Obligated large producers must have reported the latest tranche of packaging data for July 1st to December 31st 2024 by April 1st 2025.
During a webinar held earlier this month, the Environment Agency reported that it has been taking action on businesses not registering for pEPR and/or not submitting packaging data. More staff are reportedly being recruited to identify ‘free-riders’ and the businesses not yet appearing in the pEPR list, according to the Foodservice Packaging Association.
Fees for packaging placed on the market in 2024 were originally due to start in October 2024 but will now begin in October 2025. The government has so far published three sets of illustrative base fees, which are charged to producers by cost per tonne across eight packaging categories. Final base fees are due to be published by July 2025 using the full set of reported packaging data for 2024. Defra officials have said that the more data they have the more accurate the fees are likely to be.
The letter to Reed from pub and restaurant groups, coordinated by UKHospitality, said bills from suppliers are already being received, resulting in significant cost increases on top of commercial waste contracts. They said the cost would ultimately be passed on to customers.
Unintended consequences
Other businesses have warned of unintended consequences from the scheme’s design linked to the high cost placed on commonly recycled but heavy materials like glass.
Natalie Campbell, co-CEO of mineral water supplier Belu, told Footprint that instead of encouraging sustainable choices, pEPR could drive brands towards using less environmentally sound materials. “The cheaper alternatives to glass are plastic bottles and cans, and of these options using virgin PET and aluminium are cheaper than recycled because of the money needed to sort, process, and maintain the quality of the materials.”
Campbell said “the rationale behind EPR – moving away from a ‘take, make, use, throw’ model to one where producers take responsibility for packaging at the end of its life – makes perfect sense”. However, in its current form, “the new regulation is not fit for purpose”.
Elsewhere this week, new rules for simpler recycling in workplaces came into force in England. From March 31st, companies with more than ten employees, along with organisations like schools and hospitals, must arrange for separate collections of food waste, residual non-recyclable waste and dry mixed recyclable material such as plastic and paper.
