The minister in charge of bringing in Scotland’s Deposit Return System has mocked industry claims it could lead to cross-border fraud on an “industrial scale”.
Scottish environment secretary Roseanna Cunningham told MSPs on the environment committee this week that the fear was a myth propagated by opponents of the scheme, in the same way it had been used as an argument to try to stop minimum pricing in the country.
Last week the committee heard evidence from industry experts warning lorry loads of 24-pack canned drinks from England travelling to Scotland could see their value increased by £15,000 for potential crooks, with England up to four years behind Scotland’s plans to bring in DRS by April 2021.
However, Cunningham said she had listened to the claim with “incredulity”.
“Would those be the lorries driving up alongside all the lorry loads of alcohol to avoid minimum unit pricing which actually hasn’t happened?” she said.
Cunningham said there had been no evidence of grocery fraud on the back of MUP, “aside for the odd person who nips down the Tesco in Carlisle and back up the road”, and said evidence from other DRS schemes such as Norway’s showed fraud in the system as low as 1% of overall value.
However, industry bodies warn the time gap between Scotland and the rest of the UK in bringing in DRS is an opportunity for organised gangs.
“Introducing a Scotland-only DRS, years before the rest of Great Britain, runs a significant risk of being undermined by fraud,” said the British Soft Drinks Association.
Meanwhile Cunningham told the committee it was up to the UK government to “match our ambition” if it wanted to bring in a coordinated system across the UK.
However, there are doubts about the Scottish proposed implementation date, with industry bodies claiming it is “impossible” for shops to carry out the planning and infrastructure work required in the timeframe.
Cunningham admitted the date was not set in stone adding: “We want to get this up and running as soon as is practically possible and are continuing to engage on that.”
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