Key Actions
The council is conscious of the environmental impact of SUPs on the local environment and world ecosystem and will endeavour to reduce the use of SUP’s throughout its operations.
Internal Audit
One of the key problems in respect of SUPs is that we don’t know the scale of the issue. An audit of the councils SUPs items and packaging is required to understand the level of consumption across the council estate.
Once we have a baseline of SUPs consumption, it will become much easier to set annual targets going forward.
The climate emergency task group will undertake a full council wide audit on the use of SUPs. This is to be completed by the end of June 2020, subject to the provision of suitable staffing resources. This will include the identification and potential financial implications of alternative products.
Sale of Single Use Plastics
The council will work to prevent the sale of SUPs over its full operations. Quick wins, e.g. plastic bottles, plastic cups, straws will be implemented in the shortest time possible.
Internal Staff Promotion
The task group will develop an internal educational program to inform staff of the harmful impacts from SUP’s, and to encourage and provide information on alternative options.
The use of Single Use Plastics at council events
The council will discourage the use of SUPs at council held events with a view to ultimately banning their use. Given the availability of alternative products this may be on a product by product basis. For example starting with plastic cups, straws and balloon holders.
External promotion
The task group will develop an educational and promotional campaign to discourage the use of SUPs by the general public and businesses within South Ribble.
Stakeholders and providers
The task group will identify stakeholders and providers of services to the council and will encourage them to seek alternatives to SUPs. The task group will investigate the potential for including clauses within the contracts to restrict, and where feasible, prevent the use of SUPs. The task group will encourage council tenants to seek alternatives to SUPs.
Large manufacturers
As detailed above the majority of SUPs is in the form of packaging, within South Ribble there are a number of large manufacturing companies which will utilise a significant amount of packaging within their products. The task group will specifically contact these large distributors and manufactures to discuss and encourage the use of alternative packaging options to prevent the prevalence of SUPs within the industry.