Getting a handle on the weekly shopping

Mostly my purchases are everyday items off the weekly shopping list but nevertheless it's a nice feeling leaving a retail establishment holding my goods in my hand.

Is there anything more pleasing than retail therapy?

Walking around the aisles selecting my purchases, putting them carefully in a basket before going to the till to pay is such a satisfying experience.

Of course the final joy is placing my newly acquired items in a trusty plastic carrier bag before paying and picking up the two handles of the bag and gently lifting the purchases off the counter and into my safe keeping.

You know plastic carrier bags really are the most handy of things indeed they do such a good job.

If I had to carry a proper traditional shopping bag around with me at lunchtimes it would be such a fuff yet the plastic carrier is there to pick up just when you need it.

Light and very strong the lovely bags do an excellent job of transporting my items back to my trusty historic motor and onwards to my home.

Once they have served their purpose of carrying my shopping they can be used to contain my household rubbish before taking it out to my black bin which ends up as their sarcophagus until the dustmen arrive.

Being so cheap carrier bags are the ultimate product of the throw away society and as far as I am concerned they have become a part of modern life.

A while back some shops started charging for carrier bags, naturally those establishments instantly lost my custom.

To my horror my good self read yesterday on a national news site that plans are afoot to make all shops charge for carrier bags. What a disgrace!

The cost of living is high enough now without imposing what is effectively a stealth tax on carrying shopping home.

Instead of making us pay for carrier bags how about cutting down on the amount of plastic packaging our food is wrapped in?

Years ago drink came in glass bottles which carried a returnable deposit thus giving the consumer a monetary incentive to return the bottle to the shop for recycling.

First came unleaded petrol, then low energy light bulbs and now we will have to pay for carrier bags. All these changes were done in the name of supposedly saving the environment.

Petrol prices sky rocketed when unleaded was introduced. To counteract low energy bulbs the energy companies put the price of a unit of electricity up and now the price of our shopping will be increasing.

I fear these environmentalists have a lot to answer for indeed their mad cap plans to save the earth  are costing me the earth in increased prices.

What do you think?

*Don't forget to read my regular column in this Friday's edition of the printed version of the Bucks Free Press!

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