Letters October 22: No escape from the plastic bag charge on home deliveries

I AM not “holier than thou” but since I do a lot of shopping in Lidl and Aldi I have always had my own bags (The Yorkshire Post, October 20). Proper shopping bags. I see in the news that for the sake of 5-10p stupid ignorant and selfish people are now stealing trolleys.

This puts prices up for the rest of us. I have despaired of intelligent young couples using eight or more bags because they were too stupid to buy two or three proper bags. At the same time, I had wondered what the supermarkets who deliver would do. Their drivers did not know.

Nothing much except charge us for the bags. A bit of planning up front should have led them to adapt their vans to use trays and empty these at the house of the shopper. Still using them even if they get 5p a bag defeats the object.

I have around nine proper thick shopping bags plus a wheeled shopping trolley. I have used few, if any bags for years. I had wondered though what the big companies who also deliver would do as their drivers did not appear to know when I asked them and it meant about five or six plastic bags, even though I go out to the van and load my shopper and a couple of my own bags. I have now found out what you will do. Charge me 25p for bags I do not need.

I am not concerned about the 25p it cost me on a £54 order, but in store I get a choice of using my own, or paying for bags. They should all think about using plastic trays for bottles and cans, for example, which do not need bags. Of course, this will be a cost to them and to us. I only use two stores for delivery and not frequently, but maybe not at all now on principle.

From: Kim Mercer, Malton.

RE the charge for carrier bags, all it takes is some organisation. People used to plan their shops around half-day closing and shops shut on Sunday. Why can’t they plan ahead and take a bag with them when they go to the supermarket?

The only exception is the bookshops. If someone goes into Waterstones and chooses to buy a nice book, why should they be charged. I’d much rather people supported the local bookshop rather than Amazon whose tax arrangements leave a lot to be desired.

From: ME Wright, Harrogate.

JAYNE Dowle’s plastic bag charge experience is rather disconcerting; so far, I’ve heard only the occasional tut. How much longer before Europe is blamed?