The UK government could introduce a
deposit return scheme in a bid to
tackle plastic pollution in our seas.
The scheme was unveiled shortly
before the government also outlined
its aim of eliminating all avoidable
plastic waste by 2042.
Over 8 million tonnes of plastic enter
the world’s oceans each year according
to the World Economic Forum, and
UNESCO estimates that plastic debris
kills one million seabirds and 100,A yachting journalist and broadcaster
who helped shape media coverage of the
sport has died. Dennis Skillicorn, 85,
passed away on December 21, 2017. He is
remembered for reporting from Creighton’s
Naturally in the 1985 / 6 Whitbread Round
the World Race and later aboard the
1992 /3 British Steel Challenge yacht,
Commercial Union Assurance.
The chairman of the Yachting
Journalists’ Association, Barry Pickthall,
said Skillicorn’s assignments helped
shape ‘the video feeds that now reach
our computers every day from the current
Volvo Ocean Race yachts.’
Skillicorn volunteered on local hospitalradio before starting on BBC Radio
Solent. He then featured regularly on
BBC Radio 4, Radio 5 Live and BBC South
TV. In the 1960s and ’ 7 0s, Skillicorn was
the voice of Cowes Week, reporting
directly from the deck of the 193 0s J-class
yacht Velsheda. His first regular slot on
BBC TV was Country Diary, followed by
the sailing programme Open Waters.
British Steel Challenge Ali McKichan
said Skillicorn was kindhearted and
‘always had an amusing story to get us
through the long night watches’.
Skillicorn’s library of radio interviews
and broadcasts are to be saved at the
Wessex Film and Sound Archive.Yachting journalist
Dennis Skillicorn dies
Government plan to tackle marine plastic
Dennis Skillicorn took up rowing in later life to keep fit, and
even rowed around the Isle of Wight in 2001marine mammals every year.
The UK bottle deposit scheme is part
of a number of measures recommended
by the Environmental Audit Committee,
which has also asked MPs to consider
making drinks companies and
supermarkets pay more towards the
cost of recycling plastic packaging.
Currently, firms contribute 10 % of the
cost, while the taxpayer pays for 90 %.
The committee would also like to see
a mandated 50 % recycled plastic
content in plastic bottles by 2023 , more
public water fountains, and free drinking
water in all public premises that serve
food and drink to try and encourage
the use of reusable containers. It has
also called for a proposed 25p tax on
disposable coffee cups. It is estimated
that around 13 billion plastic bottles areused each year in the UK but only half
are recycled. It is hoped a deposit return
scheme would increase this rate to 90 %.
Coca-Cola Great Britain said it had
previously announced its commitment
to double the amount of recycled plastic
in its bottles to 50 % by 2020, and the
firm welcomed the reform of litter
recovery systems in the UK.
The Marine Conservation Society said
plastic drinks bottles, along with caps,
lids and other plastic drink and food
waste items, consistently feature in the
top 10 of litter types on UK beaches.
Head of clean seas at the MCS, Dr
Laura Foster, said, ‘A deposit return
system, coupled with increasing access
to free drinking water, and an effective
system to discourage waste, would
reduce this growing plastic tide’.Dennis Skillicorn Archive/PPL
Stefan Coppers/Team Brunel/VolvoNEWS