SEEING the marvellous Blue Planet on television recently brings a tear to the eye. Our oceans are being filled with plastic waste at an alarming rate, a lot of which ends up in tropical waters where sea life and coral are suffering terribly.

At last us humans have tried to do our bit to help, and lower our contribution. A while back supermarkets scrapped the free carrier bags and then charged 5p for them, which I was happy to pay.

Now you can only buy 10p bags for life to eradicate waste.

In my opinion it is not working.

The old (free) bags I would use for bin bags in my pedal bins. Now I have to buy them.

The bags for life, kept in most folks’ car boots, are often forgotten on shopping days, so more are bought, which are then unwanted and go into the bin, adding to the plastic problem.

Myself, I much prefer the old bags, which had many uses.

D. Metcalfe, Newton Aycliffe