Northabout Navigating the Kafkaesque world of the unworkable Deposit Return Scheme

As we know, grapevines are canaries in the coalmine. They’re sensitive creatures that only thrive in a narrow temperature range, and with just enough water at their roots. Too little and they wither, too much and they rot.

Every winemaker I’ve met has been extremely environmentally conscious. We’ve all seen wineries’ wastewater recycling systems, wind and solar power generation, lightweight bottles overtaking heavyweights, insecticide replaced by sexually-confusing pheromones.

Everyone in the wine supply chain is supportive of the winemakers’ efforts, and we all do what we can in our own area. For example, to pick just one of our suppliers at random: Liberty Wines is a Carbon Neutral Plus organisation, offsetting more emissions than it generates; its transport and distribution are carbon neutral; 100% of its waste is recycled or used for electricity generation, and 100% of its electricity comes from renewable sources.

You’d think, with all this enthusiasm for a greener business model, the wine trade would be keen on the Deposit Return

Scheme about to be being launched by the Scottish government. In fact, the opposite is the case. I haven’t met a single producer, importer, distributor or retailer who thinks it is fit for purpose.

It’s incredibly complicated. Several national organisations must be engaged with: Zero Waste Scotland, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, Circularity Scotland and Biffa. Circularity Scotland alone offers 44 documents to read and act on. Some, like Interface Design & Specification RVMs and Counting Centres, are a mere 16 pages long. Others, like Explaining the Producer Fee, Charges and Invoicing, are 60 pages.

Not all documents will pertain to a shop like mine, but which are and which aren’t relevant is impossible to know without reading them. That’s about 1,000 pages in total, which is not a morning’s work for any of us. More like a month’s work for a team of corporate lawyers.

Matters are not helped by the fact that so much of the text is like this: “The data format tables in the body of the document are compliant with this by describing

I’m torn between the wish to understand the rules and act responsibly, and the impossibility of knowing what that entails. Especially when the paperwork is peppered with phrases like “please note that once you start the application, you will no longer be able to go back”. It’s Kafkaesque: the regulations are impossible to understand, yet you’re fined or excluded if you don’t follow them exactly.

In October 2019, with about 20 other Orkney businesses, I attended a presentation by Zero Waste Scotland in a local hotel. With, I think, one exception, we all welcomed the idea of a deposit scheme in principle. But we immediately identified many problems with the scheme in general, and specifically with its implementation in rural or island areas.

We were assured by Zero Waste that all our concerns would be noted and answered in full before the scheme went live. Now, with that date just weeks away for producers – which, under the scheme, encompasses manufacturers, own-branders and occasional importers like me – I’m still unaware of how the scheme is going to work in many respects. So, I suspect, are its organisers. When the scheme rolls out to retailers in August it will get even more complicated and confusing.

The Scottish government should be pushing at an open door. A scheme that had been properly consulted on, clearly drafted, and effectively communicated, would have had a good chance of gaining the support of the whole industry. Instead, they are receiving almost universal pushback.

The launch of the Deposit Return Scheme needs to be delayed until it’s fit for purpose. At that point – and only then – I will support it wholeheartedly.

Duncan McLean is proprietor of Kirkness & Gorie, Kirkwall