Banning tomato ketchup sachets won’t save the planet

Warning to the working classes: the government is coming after your pleasures again. It is you who are being blamed for environmental degradation and you who will be made to pay the price. The latest wheeze of environment secretary George Eustice is to ban plastic sachets of tomato ketchup, soy sauce and whatever else from takeaways. Evidence has shown, he says, that these little sachets ‘can cause considerable harm to the marine and terrestrial environment when disposed of incorrectly’. 

Fair enough, in that we would all be better off if food manufacturers could find biodegradable substitutes for their packaging. But why is it always what might be described as common pleasures which ministers fixate upon when trying to solve social and environmental problems? Around my way I can’t say I have noticed too many fast food sachets, but I do come across the odd discarded shotgun cartridge and piece of fishing line.