Agenda item

Subject to the required notice being given, members of the public can ask questions of the Leader of the Council, Portfolio Holders or Chairmen of Committees.

The Chairman shall determine the number of questions to be tabled at a particular meeting in order to limit the time for questions and answers to 21 minutes.

On this occasion one Question has been submitted in accordance with Council Procedure Rule 10.1.

Subject to the required notice being given, members of the public could ask questions of the Leader of the Council, Portfolio Holders or Chairmen of Committees.

One question had been received, on notice, from members of the public on this occasion.

Question

Pursuant to the provisions of Council Procedure Rule 10.7, the Chairman of the Council (Councillor Bray), on behalf of Zoe Tipple & Kayleigh Seal from Unsealed Eco Refill Store, The Grove, Clacton-on-Sea asked the Leader of the Council (Councillor Stock OBE):-

“In the Council’s published Tendring Climate Emergency action plan 2020 - 2023 it states that:- 

"In 2019 the Leader of Council made a commitment to become single use plastic free by the end of 2020. Whilst an internal campaign was commenced this target is likely to be delayed due to the impact of COVID-19 and the resultant and necessary purchase of cleaning and hand sanitising products, all of which are in plastic bottles. Nonetheless efforts towards meeting this target will continue."

We have signed up to the Surfers against Sewage (SAS) Plastic Free Communities initiative and one of the many objectives to achieve before receiving official Plastic Free Community status is to have the support of our local council. Our objective states…

‘Local council makes a resolution to support our local plastic free community.

Council motion to state that the council will lead by example and phase out single use plastic.

Council motion states council will support plastic free initiatives in the area.’

In light of the statement by Councillor Neil Stock regarding the Council’s single use plastic free pledge would the Council pass a resolution to support our efforts to become a Plastic Free Community and pass the motion to lead by example and support plastic free initiatives in the area?”

Councillor Stock OBE replied to the question as follows:-

“May I say first that this question has been put on the Agenda tonight under Council Procedure rule 10.1, which is “Questions by the Public”, and this question whilst in the name of two members of the public clearly comes from a business “Unsealed Eco Refill Store”. I will answer the question, but I have to make it clear in doing so that it is not my intention to confer any business advantage or commercial endorsement on the questioners.

Thank you for your question and thank you for supporting what we are trying to achieve as a Council.

The Council continues to be committed to reducing its use of single-use plastic and I thank you for reminding me of what I said back in December 2019, that “we should cease use of single-use plastics across our business where it is possible to do so” and I went on to say that would mean no more plastic cups. But I do also think it is worth remembering that while many single-use plastics are bad news, and we can probably all do more to use less plastic, there are also many reasons why plastic can be good – even some single-use plastics. I think immediately of the eighty million and rising Covid jabs that have been given in the past few months to protect the population in this country alone. Every single dose was administered using a single-use plastic syringe, and what a fantastic thing that is!

Councillor Michael Talbot, our Cabinet member for Environment and Public Space, has taken on responsibility for climate change, and he has done so with a huge amount of vigour and a determination to ensure that we actually make a difference in how we act and what we do, rather than just paying lip service to the idea. I will be asking him to take this matter away for further consideration and discussion with our officers.

As he reported in his statement earlier the Government are intending to make major changes following their ‘Consultation on Household and Business recycling in England’, where all forms of plastic are being considered. In my view I think it more than possible that, in future, single use plastic may be severely restricted at source by controlling the current users.”