Over 2 million tonnes of plastic packaging are used in the UK each year. We throw plastic packaging every time we visit the supermarket. At best 9% is ever recycled. Much of it is unnecessary. Most plastic or single use packaging could be replaced with bio-degradeable or sustainable packaging that will not find its way into our oceans or slowly poison our environment. 

• More than 1 million seabirds and 100,000 marine animals die from plastic pollution every year.
• 100% of baby sea turtles have plastic in their stomachs.
• There is now 5.25 trillion macro and micro pieces of plastic in our ocean 
• Every day around 8 million pieces of plastic makes their way into our oceans.
• The world produces 381 million tonnes in plastic waste yearly – this is set to double by 2034.
• Between 8 to 14 million tonnes enters our ocean every year.
• More than 1 million plastic bags end up in the trash every minute.
• 1 in 3 fish caught for human consumption contain plastic.
• Plastic microbeads are estimated to be one million times more toxic than the seawater around it. Products containing microbeads can release 100,000 tiny beads with just one squeeze.

For way too long the supermarkets and global FMCG companies that supply them have ignored the problem and us the customer.  It is time to legislate. 

This petition is aimed at forcing compliance by legally requiring the industry to cease all single use plastics and unnecessary packaging by 2023.  Let's lobby parliament to change the law and outlaw this practice.  2023 gives all parties long enough to come up with alternatives and lead on this critical environmental issue.  Hold them accountable!  lobby your MP for a change in the law.  Let the UK lead on this global issue by stopping this global catastrophe at its source.