Greens Healthy Oceans spokesperson, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson, today welcomed the announcement by the European Union to ban a range of single-use plastics by 2021.

“Our oceans are choking on plastic and just this week we’ve had confirmed that microplastics are now ubiquitous within the human body.

“This is a problem of immense proportions that has been a long time coming.

“For too long, government has stepped aside and allowed the industry who profits off the proliferation of plastic to avoid taking responsibility.