Scottish convenience stores will have to invest around £15m in the next six weeks to be ready for the Deposit Return Scheme, the Scottish Parliament heard today.
Circular Economy Minister Lorna Slater told Parliament that Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme will launch on 16 August as planned.
Earlier today Circularity Scotland revealed that producers responsible for more than 95% of the containers sold in Scotland are now registered for the scheme.
However, Parliament heard that less than 20% of producers have signed up for the scheme, but this figure was not confirmed by Slater.
It has been reported that the UK government was set to block DRS because it would contravene the UK’s Internal Markets Act, which was passed following Brexit, but Slater told Parliament that a formal request for an Internal Markets Act exemption was made in 2021 by the Scottish government and this is being worked through.
Parliament also heard about plans to bring forward amendments to the DRS regulations so that only the largest grocery retailers will initially be obliged to provide a home delivery take-back service and all other businesses will be exempt.
Slater said: “The volume of materials and the significant number of producers that have signed up means that we now have a viable scheme with momentum to August 16 because those businesses have committed and signed on the dotted line.
“For those businesses that have not yet signed, we will continue to work with them to bring them online because we do want all small producers to participate in this scheme.”
