Pauline Hanson has been called out over her public rant on paper shopping bags this week, with an environmentalist telling Yahoo News she is stoking the fire about something that the “vast majority” of Australians are already on board with.
The One Nation leader lost her cool on Tuesday after the paper bag carrying her Woolworths groceries ripped in Canberra. In a video she shared online, Hanson accused Woolworths and Coles of “making a fortune” from charging shoppers 25 cents at the checkout for paper bags that “split and break on you all the time”.
“I didn’t carry my own bags with me, so anyway, this is what you have to put up with,” Hanson said in the video, carrying the ripped paper bag. “I’m over it. I’m so angry about it.
“They fleece you 25 cents for every bag, only for them to break before they make the kitchen bench. You can’t tell me they cost the supermarkets 25 cents each either. It’s highway robbery for cheap rot that isn’t saving the planet.”
In the text accompanying her video, Hanson signs off by saying, “Bring back the trusty plastic bags, will you!”
It’s a common gripe that supermarket paper bags easily fall apart, and after posting the video on social media, many agreed with Hanson. One woman called the paper bags “stupid”, while others called for plastic bags to make a return.
However, Jeff Angel, the founder of Total Environment Centre, told Yahoo that Hanson is missing the point altogether.
“I think it’s just a bit of cheap minority grandstanding,” he said of Hanson’s rant. “It’s ignorant of the perils of plastic pollution.”
Paper bags only a means of transition, environmentalist argues
Angel claims supermarkets introduced the paper bags as “instruments of transition” from plastic bags and reusable bags, with the paper bags simply available in the interim while shopper behaviour changes.
“The 25-cent price is to further encourage the switch over to reusables… It’s an instrument for people to get into reusables, which last hundreds of times,” Angel told Yahoo. “The vast majority of shoppers are now using reusable bags.”
Admitting she forgot to bring her own bags highlights the point, Angel explained. The cost of the paper bag and the fact that they are susceptible to breaking are meant to deter shoppers from using them.
Supermarkets continue to distance themselves from plastic bags
Woolworths and Coles started to phase out single-use plastic bags back in 2018, and the supermarkets are now phasing out plastic produce bags. All stores in Western Australia this week extended restrictions on soft plastic produce bags to nuts and confectionery, after they were earlier removed from fresh fruit and veg aisles.
Angel said Australians understand the negative impact mass plastic bag use has on the environment.
“Bringing back the lightweight plastic bags is bad for the environment and is completely out of sync with the community’s concern about litter and the health impacts of plastics,” he said. “They last for decades and decades, breaking up in the environment,” he said.
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