Ban of plastic bags in Brossard's - The Canadian Plastic Bag Association (CPBA) issued a legal letter Français
SAINT-HUBERT, QC, Feb. 11, 2016 /CNW Telbec/ - The Canadian Plastic Bag Association (CPBA) today issued a legal letter to the City of Brossard demanding that the City cease and desist from passing its proposed By-law 351 to ban plastic shopping bags from being distributed in the City of Brossard because "the ban of thin plastic bags which it purports to enact, does not serve any useful purpose, and to the contrary, will cause significant damage to both the environment and the economy."
According to the legal letter, "the passage of such proposed By-law would be an abusive and unreasonable exercise of power, inconsistent with the best interests of the City, its residents, and other stakeholders."
The industry is very concerned about the lack of public process and involvement which they claim has been anti-democratic. According to the industry, they made numerous requests to meet with councilors, but were refused. And they provided the City on February 5th a detailed letter and supporting third party scientific evidence and research showing that such a ban is harmful and counter to the public good.
"All stakeholders – even those most negatively affected by a ban like convenience store owners, retailers, and bag manufacturers – have been completely shut out, " says Marc Robitaille, President of Omniplast, a local bag manufacturer and member of the Canadian Plastic Bag Association (CPBA). "There has been no public discussion of the negative environmental, economic and social consequences of a complete ban. All we want is an open dialogue and working with the scientific data."
The ban according to the industry has been poorly researched as evidenced by its January 19th motion which is riddled with factual errors and a lack of understanding of sustainable practices (pages 99-103). The very definition of a plastic bag by the municipality as single use is inaccurate. The bags are multi-purpose, multi-use bags. Over 60% of the bags are reused two or more times and 33% of all bags are recycled according to the latest technical data. 93% of all bags are reused and recycled.
"Environmentally, the ban spells trouble for the environment because the City did not take time to research how people use the bags and their secondary reuse to manage household waste," adds Robitaille. "Residents will now be forced to buy heavier plastic kitchen catchers to manage their household. These contain 74% more plastic which will add 32% more plastic to the Brossard waste stream."
About the Canadian Plastic Bag Association
The Canadian Plastic Bag Association (the "CPBA") is an incorporated advocacy organization representing a wide range of manufacturers and distributors of plastic shopping bags in Quebec and throughout Canada. CPBA members are committed to operating in conformity with sound environmental practice and the principles of product stewardship and work co-operatively with retailers and government to pursue the three R's (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle).
About the Canadian Plastics Industry Association
The Canadian Plastics Industry Association is the national voice of the plastics industry in Canada, representing the interests of processors, material suppliers, equipment manufacturers and brand owners across Canada since 1943.
SOURCE Canadian Plastic Bag Association
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