Irish tax on carrier bags has unintended effect

BBC's Countryfile recently featured a piece in which an interviewee claimed that the Irish Government's tax on the use of plastic carrier bags in supermarkets was actually having the opposite effect to that intended.

Meant as an environmental tax to try and reduce the amount of plastic going into landfill through one-time use of carrier bags, the claim was that previously many bags found subsequent use as liners to kitchen waste bins and the like. Apparently the new tax has made this use uneconomic, and so the sales of "pukka" bin liners has increased accordingly.

So a well-meaning intervention has had unintended consequences - a sharp reminder of the need for broad systems thinking in organisations and government.