ENVI Committee Report

Supplementary Report of the New Democratic Party of Canada

New Democrats would like to thank all the witnesses who appeared before the Standing Committee on the Environment and Sustainable Development and those who submitted written briefs during the Committee’s study of single-use plastics.

While we support the majority of the report and recommendations, we differ on some of the conclusions and recommendations.

As the report notes, many Canadians are familiar with the “Three Rs” – reduce, reuse, recycle. While improving recycling is an essential element of moving towards a circular economy and zero plastic waste, we feel that further emphasis is needed on reducing plastic production and use and moving to more reusable items and reuse systems to meaningfully address the plastic pollution crisis.

Reduce

Canadians are concerned about plastic pollution and widely support a ban on single-use plastic items. However, the Government’s proposed ban on six single-use plastic items currently covers less than one per cent of Canada’s current plastic use. A poll by Oceana Canada in December 2020 found that two-thirds of Canadians supported expanding the list of items to be banned.

The Committee heard from witnesses and received briefs that recommended that proposed list of items should be expanded to include other items, including:

• Items often found littered in the environment, such as coffee cups and lids, cigarette butts and all forms of polystyrene
• Items already banned in other jurisdictions, such as lightweight produce bags and plastic egg cartons
• Materials and resins that are particularly harmful in the environment, or that contain toxic chemicals

Since the Committee last heard from witnesses in May 2021, the Government has published draft regulations. The University of Victoria’s Environmental Law Centre has responded to those draft regulations with recommendations including expanding the narrow definitions of single-use plastics away from durability requirements and towards their intended use and expanding the scope of the ban on foodservice ware materials to include bisphenols, phthalates, and perfluoroalkyl substances.

New Democrats recommend that Government of Canada expand the list of harmful single-use plastics to be banned to include other problematic plastics items in order to reduce plastic pollution and the strain on municipal recycling facilities.

Reuse

While relatively little time was spent during the study discussing reuse, the Committee heard from some witnesses that the ban on harmful single-use plastics should be paired with incentives and investment to support the development of reuse systems, which can create good local jobs with relatively little investment.

New Democrats endorse the recommendation heard by the Committee that the Government should stop subsidizing the production of virgin plastics, a segment of the oil and gas industry, and instead support a just transition plan for chemical workers and plastics manufacturers that shifts the focus of manufacturing to durable products, develops widespread reuse systems and invests in mechanical recycling able to turn durable materials back into reusable products of a similar value.

New Democrats feel that reuse systems merit further attention and study. We strongly support the recommendation that the Government of Canada host a host a roundtable for reuse companies and organizations, working with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, to learn more about what infrastructure is needed to support reuse across Canada.

Recycle

The Committee heard from witnesses that recycling alone will not be the solution to our plastic pollution problem and warned against relying on new recycling technologies in place of taking measures to reduce plastic production and use. Without further intervention Canada’s plastic use is predicted to increase by 30 precent by 2030 and will outpace any improvements in recycling.

Witnesses also warned that so-called advanced or chemical recycling systems are “false solutions” to the plastic pollution crisis that are “waste disposal in disguise” and face some of the same challenges as traditional recycling when it comes to the need to have a relatively pure homogenous flow of plastic to be economically viable. As Ashley Wallace told the Committee, “The vast majority of chemical recycling systems that exist today are not actually turning plastic into new plastic. They are turning plastic into fuel, and that fuel is then burned, which means that plastics are really only a pit stop in a fossil fuel's existence from extraction to tail pipe.”

While New Democrats welcome the recommendation to invest in expanding the recycling infrastructure in Canada and improving the rate at which plastics are recycled, we caution that such investments should focus on improving mechanical recycling capacity and not on false solutions to the plastic pollution crisis.