By Claire Fry

A WORCESTER businessman who sells plastic bags has hit out at critics saying the items should be banned.

Andrew Smith, Managing Director of B Smith Packaging, on the Shire Business Park in Warndon believes it is consumers and retailers whose attitudes to the humble plastic bag should change.

Mr Smith, whose company sells polythene, paper and cotton bags throughout the country said he believed people should re-use their bags rather than get new ones.

"What I find very frustrating is that the real answer to save the environment is not to use bags at all. Why not take an existing bag to the shop and use that?

"Everyone is jumping on the bandwagon saying that polythene bags are public enemy number one. But the truth is they are better than paper. A paper bag takes much more energy to produce and the delivery aspect of it, it takes up a much bigger space. For example, in a box, there will be 500 polythene bags but in the same size box, there will be 50 paper bags."

He added polythene bags were now being made to be degradable - and should have a life of around 18 months. He also added many paper bags had a polythene laminate for presentation reasons, so while they would appear to be better, were not.

"I feel that all of us should be cutting down on our packaging but by stopping plastic bags altogether is not the answer," he added.

"If everybody decided they didn't want bags, the shop giants would take note. But at the moment people don't do that.

If you buy an expensive jacket you expect a bag at the end of it. If you end up with a grotty bag you wouldn't be impressed.

So it is everyone's mindset that has got to change," he said.

He said the places, such as Modbury in Devon, which has become the first town in Britain to ban plastic bags from shops.still used paperbags and were not addressing the issue.

But supplier of the official Modbury cotton shopping bag, Rob Baker of Bags2Keep based in Cornwall said that plastic bags, while they would degrade, would take 1,000 years to fully disappear.

"People can stop having plastic bags because it's something they know they can do, even if it is just a little thing, for the environment, without it having a major impact on their lives," he said.

A WORCESTERSHIRE town is baffled after national newspapers have highlighted their traders wanting to ban plastic bags.

Evesham was one of 74 towns named as planning to ban plastic bags.

Wychavon District Council and Evesham Town council both say they know nothing of plans to lobby the Government for the fight to ban them.

Evesham Town Council Clerk Frank Green said he did not know where the news had come from - and nothing had been mentioned or discussed in any meetings.

"The subject has never crossed our agenda," he added.

Trader Louise Roberts, who runs Word of Mouth Coffee Shop on Vine Street said: "I am finding out who is starting this and I will be getting on-board with it. But we don't know anything either.

"We are a cafe but we use a lot of organic and biodegradable products. So we would like to reduce the use of plastic bags," she added.

Member of the town and district council, and part of the Evesham Fair Trade group Reg Jakeman said he had received a number of calls from various people but also did now know anything.

The articles, published in two national newspapers last week, both show Evesham as planning to ban bags.

Information for this was sourced from the Marine Conservation Society website - which in turn had helped compile the list with Modbury-based group Plastic Bag Free, which successfully saw the town become plastic-bag free.

Rebecca Hosking, who started the group, said she had been contacted by a female in the town a number of times asking about the group and how Evesham could go bag free too - which is how it found itself onto the list.