Morrisons last of big four to scrap plastic bags

The Bradford-based grocer has pledged to phase out use of the 5p bags from March, just days after Asda revealed a similar move.

Sainsbury’s removed single-use carrier bags from its stores when the 5p levy was introduced back in 2015, and Tesco followed suit last August.

Morrisons said it has been considering the move for some time and added that a trial in several stores had been met with a positive response from shoppers.

A Morrisons spokesman said: “We are listening to customers and they’re telling us they want to reduce the amount of plastic getting out into the environment.

“The ambition behind introducing a charge on single-use carrier bags was to reduce their usage and we now feel the time is right to stop offering them altogether.”

Retailers have been under increasing pressure from shoppers to reduce the use of plastic across their businesses after a series of high-profile campaigns highlighting the damage to marine life of waste plastic in the ocean.

Iceland has vowed to stop using plastic packaging on all of its own-label products by 2023.