Jeremy Iron Film 'Trashed' and EU moves on Plastic Bags

Caught Jeremy Irons on C4 News last night railing against the waste our society produces and moves in the EU to ban Plastic bags?

Here is trailer from the film mentioned in news item ... Trashed

If you cannot see the embedded video the link is here

DWI Meeting 28th Feb - Banish Plastic Bags

Deal With It's Feb meeing will be on Plastic bags and their impact on the environment and wildlife

We have Amber Bytheway from the Deal based 'Banish The Plastic Bag' Campaign (if you have not signed the petition you can find it here ) and Patrick Old Chair of the Sandwich Bay Bird Observatory

The meeting ison Tuesday28th Feb at 7:30pm at Dealability, 43 Victoria Rd Deal.


All welcome

No Plastic Bags in Deal

The local campaign to banish the plastic bag in Deal was on the streets today handling out leaflets.

The Dover & Deal Coop party gave a donation of £25 towards the campaign.

More acitivity is planned with the build up to Xmas.

Interested in joining in email PlasticBags@dealwithit.org

Have you signed the petition yet - http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/12786

Ban the Plastic bag ... Kent News Report

A Walmer teenager has launched a government e-petition calling for a nationwide ban on plastic bags.

From Kent News. Dover Grammar School for Girls pupil, Amber Bytheway, launched a campaign with help from local environmental group Deal With It.

Over the next 10 months, the 16-year-old needs to get 100,000 signatures to force a debate in the House of Commons.

Her e-petition calls to banish plastic bags, explaining the detrimental impact they are having on the world’s oceans and marine life and the need to cut the amount of waste sent to landfill.
“Approximately one million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals die from ingestion or entanglement in plastics every single year,” she said.

“Not only that, but the littering of plastic bags spoils our beautiful environment.
“Plastic bags are made from polyethylene, known as polythene which is toxic and seeing as plastic bags cannot biodegrade, the pieces photodegrade, only getting smaller and smaller and smaller contaminating our waterways, soils and oceans - even entering the food chain, including human beings’.”

She added that the bags were made using precious finite oil resources which were becoming scarce.

“I think it is really sad what is happening to our planet so I decided I would try and do something about it,” she said.

“We have to change our ways now, because our planet cannot sustain our way of living.
“The number of plastic bags consumed in the past year rose by 333 million and it is time the Government knuckled down and made a change.”
To sign go to http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/12786

Banish the Plastic Bag - new video

Local Dealie, Amber has a made a new video to support her campaign  to Banish the Plastic Bags in the UK: http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/12786




Video is here: http://youtu.be/i0DAfG87X7w

Victoria's Green Matters - 2nd Sept

Deal With IT's Secretary Victoria Nicholls writes a regular column in the East Kent Mercury:
Shoppers in Britain have done well over the last few years to reduce the amount of plastic bags they use. In fact, 43% fewer bags were used in 2009/10 than in 2006, when records were first kept. Figures collected from the top eight supermarkets show that total bag usage fell by 10% during the past year.

The Waste & Resources Action Programme (Wrap) informs us that figures for May this year tend to show that this reduction in use has slowed down. There was a voluntary agreement between the government, the British Retail Consortium and the supermarkets to decrease the number of plastic bags handed out to shoppers by 50% by spring 2009. Wrap reported that by May last year retailers had achieved a 48% reduction. A rate of reduction of 45% has been achieved this year, showing a drop since the voluntary agreement ended.

Can we really congratulate ourselves? Of course, to reduce the use of plastic to any degree is to be applauded but we must continue this reduction until plastic bags are not given out in shops at all, as in mainland Europe. Campaigners want continued reduction in plastic bag use and if this does not happen voluntarily, then they want to see a bag tax. This was spectacularly effective in Eire where a price per bag of 10 pence was introduced and a 95% reduction in use was achieved. This serves to emphasise that a resource is usually squandered if it is free and easily available but if it has a price, it is valued more greatly.

It is easy to see, when we visit some supermarkets, that although bags have been removed from the holders at the end of the conveyor belts with the intention that shoppers must ask if they need a bag, assistants are now placing opened bags out for customer use.  Please remember to take your own bags with you and let’s try to end the use of plastic bags completely.

The Majestic Plastic Bag - A Mockumentary

A short & moving film .... guaranteed that you will have a tear in your eye by the end - if only because its all unfortunately true!



In case you cannot see the embedded video ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLgh9h2ePYw