By Casey Neill
Plastic bags are “a very Greater Dandenong problem” and the council is moving to address it.
At the Monday 10 July meeting, councillor Matthew Kirwan successfully moved for a report into eliminating single-use plastic bags from council operations.
The report will also look at discouraging use of the bags and encouraging alternatives at community events, banning or reducing their use at Dandenong Market, and advocating to the State Government for a ban.
The report is due by the end of the year.
Four days later Coles and Woolworths announced that they would phase out giving free plastic shopping bags to customers over the next 12 months.
Cr Kirwan said Australians dumped 7150 plastic bags into landfills every minute.
“The average plastic bag is used for just 12 minutes yet may last in our environment for around 1000 years,” he said.
He said South Australia, Tasmania, the Northern Territory and the ACT had already banned single use plastic bags.
“But this is a very Greater Dandenong problem,” he said.
“Just go to Dandenong Creek, Yarraman Creek or Mile Creek – three creeks that impact every suburb in Greater Dandenong and you will see the littering of plastic bags and other soft plastics.
“Plastic that will either stay where it is and pollute Greater Dandenong or travel down to Port Phillip bay.”
Cr Kirwan said that 9.8 per cent of Greater Dandenong waste was plastic bags, according to a Household Recycling Stream Audit conducted in November 2013.
“This notice of motion asks for a report to investigate how we as a council can potentially reduce our use of soft plastics, encourage the reduction by others in our community and also advocacy options,” he said.
“I ask our councillors for their support to investigate these options, and other ideas that officers come up with, of how we as a council can play our part in reducing soft plastics pollution.”
The motion passed unanimously.
