Campaigners, including the
Campaign to Protect Rural England(
CPRE), said with only larger retailers required to take part in the scheme, consumers will find it inconsistent and the small retailers won’t have the chance to reduce their costs.
In yesterday’s Queen’s Speech a new 5p charge on plastic bags in England was announced. It will come into force in 2015.
The 'bag tax' was condemned as "a spectacular failure to listen to the guidance given by every sector asked for advice by announcing today that its proposed scheme will exclude small retailers, paper bags and biodegradable bags".
CPREalso expressed concerns about changes to planning laws and infrastructure plans.
Responding to proposals to increase housing supply Shaun Spiers, chief executive of
CPRE, said:
"We need to provide many more homes to meet the needs of a growing population but we need a robust planning system to ensure they are delivered in the best locations.
"At present the government’s planning approach, which too often involves imposing large developments on local communities through planning appeals, is not working. We welcome measures to encourage the reuse of suitably sited public sector land and small housebuilders.
"Garden cities may be part of the solution but only if they are locally supported, help regenerate our existing cities and provide significant amounts of genuinely affordable housing."
Spiers added that proposals to exempt smaller house builders from environmental controls are "bizarre", and would lead to new homes being built that "leak energy".
“This announcement is just storing up trouble for the future. It is bad for fuel poverty and bad for the battle against climate change."
CPREalso charged ministers with "making life easier" for fracking companies and a lack of focus on "the strongest possible controls to protect the environment and communities".
That is not only right in principle, it’s sensible politics if the Government wants to get public consent to fracking.”
And
CPREalso expressed concern about "a mad dash for roads reform" and the threat to the countryside from ill-thought infrastructure plans.
"The Infrastructure Bill would create a new roads company and lock its funding into law in a drive to deliver the biggest road-building programme in 50 years," Spiers said.
"This will not only mean further cuts to bus funding and rises in the cost of train tickets, it will also lead to silo thinking, making it harder to join up different forms of transport.
"Hundreds of miles of new and widened roads will threaten swathes of countryside, nationally treasured landscapes, ancient woodland and wildlife sites. We need to prioritise improving and reopening rural railways rather than risk damaging our landscapes for little gain."