Tesco deducts £3.4m from plastic bag charity funds
UK supermarket Tesco deducted £3.4m ($4.5m) in administrative costs from the funds for charitable donations raised through the plastic bag tax introduced in England in 2015, according to government statistics. The deductions equate to over 10% of the £31.9m raised from bag sales in the year to March 2017. No other supermarket in the top ten such companies made deductions. The tax has led to an 83% reduction in plastic bag use, equivalent to 9 billion fewer bags. Tesco ended the sale of 5p bags in August and is now offering only reusable 10p bags.
These datasets provide the information submitted to government about single use carrier bag charging in England, including the number and proceeds of single-use plastic carrier bags issued/charged by retailers. It includes mandatory data on bags sold under the charge and voluntary data on submitted by retailers.