Seeing the red instead of turning green: The staff of the supermarket checkouts attacked the ban on plastic bags in Australia – News – The Columbus Dispatch

CANBERRA, Australia – Australian supermarket workers found themselves at the forefront of a violent consumer reaction to measures to ban single-use plastic bags, an implicated minority abusing cashiers and a customer putting his hand to the throat. Retail giants Woolworths and Coles, which account for about 70 percent of Australia's supermarket trade, announced new plastics and packaging reduction targets last month in response to customers wanting a greener shopping experience [19659002]. The union of their employees, the Association of Employees of the Distribution Sector, said that some customers had reacted badly to reusable plastic bags for single use replaced by 15 reusable bags of one Australian cent (11 cents ). .com / columbusdispatch and connect with us on Twitter @DispatchAlerts

A customer has taken his anger at the lack of free plastic bags on a female server A member of a Woolworths supermarket in Mandurah , on the west coast, June 22, two days after the start of the ban in the states of Western Australia, New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland. "I do not know how much pressure he has applied, but any physical contact is inappropriate and especially if it's from behind, I picture it, it's particularly daunting," he adds. [19659002] The Woolworths state general manager, Karl Weber, said the police had been contacted about the incident and that the employee had received help. had been banned from the store.

"The safety of our team is of the utmost importance and we do not tolerate any abusive behavior towards them under any circumstances," said Weber in a statement

. would be given free for 10 days until Sunday, July 8th as customers would become accustomed to the absence of single-use bags.

Coles introduced its ban on single-use bags to count July 1 and opened all the caisses

The Minister of The Queensland Environment, Leeanne Enoch, predicted that customers bringing their own bags to supermarkets would soon become second nature.

"It will take a bit of time for some members of the mass market.Our audience must get used to remember to take their reusable bags, but it will not take long before many of us do not use it as a daily practice. "

The union has launched a public information campaign to discourage customers and, in addition to complaints about the cost of bags, the union has stated that customers are lobbying on the staff for that they overload the reusable bags, that they are fewer in number and that they handle the unhygienic bags that they brought with them.Before Woolworths and Coles do take measures, half of the eight states and territories of Australia had already banned by law the single-use plastic bags

.Western Australia has joined South Australia, Tasmania, Northern Territory and Te Australia's Capital Region

But the most populous states, New South Wales and Victoria – where more than half of Australia's population lives – have resisted change. ] The European Union has proposed to ban plastic products, such as straws, to reduce waste that spoil beaches and oceans.