Interview with Craig Reucassel, ABC Radio Sydney Breakfast

Morning, Minister. MURRAY WATT: G'day, Craig. Good to be with you.

CRAIG REUCASSEL: Yeah, so Labor's been promising national plastic regulation for years now. Why have you walked away from these packaging reforms? MURRAY WATT: Yeah, I wouldn't quite put it that way, Craig.

CRAIG REUCASSEL: I’m sure you wouldn’t. MURRAY WATT: Well, I guess we're taking a different approach. And firstly, can I say that I do really understand and I share people's concern about the amount of waste we have in the community and the need to make change to packaging rules in particular.

What we're doing is pursuing a different approach to what we had earlier proposed. And today we’ve got a meeting of the federal and state and territory environment ministers in Brisbane where I’ll be seeking agreement that we will harmonise all of the rules and regulations that apply to some of our most problematic plastics in society. We had taken a different approach previously, and it is right that we are now looking at taking a different approach to that.

What we're trying to do is balance the need to really tackle plastics, packaging, waste in general, with the very real cost of living pressures that Australians are facing at the moment. And we want to be sure that reforms that we put in place won't unduly increase the price of grocery bills, cost of living in general, at a time when so many Australians are really feeling the pinch.

CRAIG REUCASSEL: Okay, well, let's have a look at this. The government's invested millions of dollars in building new facilities for recycling. We're now seeing some of these facilities fail.

We just saw the closure of a plastics recycling plant in Adelaide that had got $20 million in funding from the government. Isn’t this funding a waste if you don't create a system that actually encourages recycling and people to use it? MURRAY WATT: Well, you're right that we have invested over $200 million in building and upgrading recycling facilities around the country.

That's obviously played a role in reducing, from memory, it's over a million tonnes of waste and packaging every year. That's a good thing, and we want to support the jobs in those facilities as well. What we've also got to do is make sure that we are reducing the amount of plastic that is being produced in the first place and consumed in the first place and lifting demand for recycled materials.

And that's what we're going to be working on today with other ministers. CRAIG REUCASSEL: So the policy that was there was extended producer responsibility. It would basically make it so that those that put the plastic into the system would pay a small fee and would be responsible for it being recycled at the end.

Under your new we all come together and harmonise our laws, how do you create that incentive for people to recycle? MURRAY WATT: Well, what we actually want to do is actually take a range of products off the market, Craig, in the first place. The point of the harmonisation exercise with states and territories is that, as you would be aware, right now in some states you can use certain plastic products, in other states you can't.

South Australia has banned the use of those little plastic soy sauce bottles, but other states you can use it. And what we’ll be doing today is trying to seek agreement to remove enough number of damaging plastic products off the market altogether. So that … CRAIG REUCASSEL: [Interrupts] But that's going to do- I mean, let's be honest about it, that's going to do almost nothing to the overall problem of plastic recycling.

That's going to deal with maybe, you know, one, 2 per cent of the plastic that we actually have there. A lot of the plastic packaging that we have is packaging that we know will still be there. It's there for food safety reasons, it's there for convenience reasons, it's there for other reasons, and it will still be there at the end of your environment ministers’ meeting.

That large majority, the question at the moment is there's no incentive to actually recycle it. We spoke to Danny Gallagher from IQRenew. They've built a system to deal with the red cycle crisis, the soft plastics recycling there.

They've now processed all of that stuff. They now only have enough stock to run the plant one or two days a week because there's no incentive for people to actually recycle the stuff that we know is in the system and that will still be in the system at the end of your meeting. So how do you solve that problem?

MURRAY WATT: Well, I don't agree that what we'll be seeking to do today will achieve very little. So, for example, what we want to do is get all states and territories in line to remove altogether things like the packaging that we have when you get your TV delivered, all of the plastics and packaging within those boxes, which actually produces a lot of waste every single year.

Right now, people can use plastic confetti, which can actually end up in river systems and all sorts of things. We want to try and look at what we can do to ban that sort of thing as well. So I don't agree that what we're proposing to do today will achieve very little.

I think it will make a difference. CRAIG REUCASSEL: [Interrupts] Okay, let's say you achieve 20 per cent, 30 per cent. It's still going to be a large amount.

I still- look, I've accepted after years of war on waste, there's still an enormous amount of plastic packaging that we're not going to get rid of. It's become totally part of our system. The question then becomes how do we actually put in place some kind of incentive to recycle it?

Now, the proposal from the waste industry for extended producer responsibility, you said this was going to lead to a kind of cost of living problem. This is what Gayle Sloan, the CEO of Waste Management Resource Recovery Association of Australia said to us. GAYLE SLOAN: The cost is already there.

You're paying it as a rate payer. You're paying it at the supermarket shelf. And what we're only saying is what we're seeing in Europe is make the generators pay and take the costs off the rate payer and the waste industry now. [End of excerpt] CRAIG REUCASSEL: So aren't we already paying the cost of throwing out all this plastic anyway?

MURRAY WATT: Certainly through waste collection and landfill sites, there is cost on ratepayers at the moment. But what we also need to acknowledge is that if we do require manufacturers of plastic items to pay a fee, they're going to pass that on to consumers in the form of the price of the groceries that they pay. Equally … CRAIG REUCASSEL: [Interrupts] And what figures ...

MURRAY WATT: If I could just finish that point, Craig. Equally, the other thing that some of the recyclers are looking for and manufacturers are looking for is mandating recycled content in products. That is going to be more expensive for consumers when they do their shopping.

Now, I'm not blind to the need to take action there. What we are trying to do, though, is take action today, which will make a difference to plastics, reduce waste, while being sensitive to the cost of living concerns that people are experiencing right now. CRAIG REUCASSEL: The modelling I'd seen kind of suggested it was going to be, like, 20 cents a week.

In terms of the cost of living problems we're facing right now, I mean, you just decide- the government's just decided not to go ahead with their further cut to the petrol excise, for instance. We’re talking far bigger impacts than maybe 20 cents a week. Is this really something you're concerned about pushing?

MURRAY WATT: Well, I've seen different figures, Craig. Certainly I've seen the kind of figures that you're talking about, but I've seen different figures that have higher costs as well. We're not ruling out taking this kind of action into the future.

What we want to do at the moment, though, is take the step that we're proposing today to harmonise those rules, remove a lot of the different plastic packaging products off the market altogether nationwide rather than just in some states, do what we can at the moment while people are feeling the pinch, and consider further action down the track. It’s also worth mentioning, Craig, that this is not the only issue that we'll be considering when it comes to waste and recycling today.

We're going to be considering a really good proposal from the New South Wales government to bring in place those product stewardship schemes for things like batteries and solar panels. Packaging, I recognise, is a really important issue to people, but it's not the only waste and recycling issue that we're facing as a country, and we're seeking to take those further steps on things like batteries and solar panels as well today.

CRAIG REUCASSEL: Yeah. And just- we've got some text messages from people saying, ask the Minister about the battery recycling. What are you going to do with battery recycling to make it so we’re kind of- our rates are very low compared to overseas.

MURRAY WATT: That's right. I mean, and obviously there's an environmental issue there, but equally, we are seeing too many fires being created by the inappropriate disposal of batteries in landfill sites. New South Wales has put on the table a proposal for a stewardship scheme, which would see a small fee charged for batteries.

That is something that most states and territories are more agreeable to, and I really hope that we can take some progress on that today. The reality is that we can't take action on every single product at the same time. We’re trying to work cooperatively with industry, states and territories on product by product to make some improvements.

And I really hope that we'll get there with the agreement of states and territories today. CRAIG REUCASSEL: I'm glad you're pushing for that. I just- I don't quite understand, though, why is a slight fee on batteries not a cost of living problem, whereas a slight fee on plastics is?

MURRAY WATT: Well, I think the point is that there is more agreement with the different levels of government around batteries because of the wider problems that they're causing, the fires, the other sort of issues as well than we have seen to date on packaging. As a federal government, we do need the cooperation of state and territory governments to make advances in these places.

We've been able to get further on things like batteries than we have been able to do with packaging. As the federal minister, I'll keep trying to drive reform as far as I can, but we do need states and territories to come on board as well. CRAIG REUCASSEL: Well good on you, Minister.

We appreciate you speaking to us today and we'll watch with great interest what passes today's environment ministers’ meeting in Brisbane. Thanks for it. MURRAY WATT: Thanks, Craig.

Good to talk. We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of country throughout Australia and recognise their continuing connection to land, waters and culture. We pay our respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.