Britain enacting world's first plastic tax for products with less than 30 per cent recycled material

Britain is pressing ahead with the world's first plastic tax. It will hit plastic manufacturers that fail to include 30 per cent recycled content. It will also provide a huge boost to the recycling industry by massively increasing demand for recycled plastic. Treasury Secretary Robert Jenrick said: 'Every single day we're all polluting the planet with items that can't be recycled. In the UK alone, we buy 2 million tonnes of plastic each year. 'Less than half of that is recycled, and the rest goes straight into landfill, some of which makes its way into our seas and oceans, and harms marine life. We can't go on like this.' Dumping half of all the plastic sold in the UK threatens the natural world as well as being a huge waste of resources, according to Treasury research. The need to make use of plastic waste comes as China closes its doors to the bulk of British plastic waste – making it all the more urgent that we find ways to deal with it in the UK.