{"id":579192,"date":"2026-07-10T19:54:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T19:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/579192\/"},"modified":"2026-07-10T19:54:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T19:54:08","slug":"senator-re-turn-scheme-is-an-unnecessary-torture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/579192\/","title":{"rendered":"Senator: Re-Turn Scheme is an \u2018unnecessary torture\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

An Aont\u00fa senator has described the Re-turn deposit scheme as \u201can unnecessary torture\u201d \u2013 and says that she predicts a hike on the deposit charged on cans and bottles.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Aont\u00fa\u2019s Sarah O\u2019Reilly criticised the bottle and can recycling scheme, amid the operator\u2019s appearance at the Oireachtas committee on Climate, Environment and Energy this week.<\/p>\n

It comes as retailers issued a warning that an incoming Re-Turn style deposit scheme, to be introduced into the North next autumn, paying higher rates per bottle, will spark an \u201cexodus\u201d of shoppers bringing their recyclables across the border.<\/p>\n

The Convenience Stores and Newsagents Association (CSNA) told the Oireachtas Committee on Wednesday that a scheme to be launched in Northern Ireland will negatively impact shop owners and will reduce the number of bottles and cans being recycled in the Republic.<\/p>\n

CSNA President Sara Orme was also critical of the Return Scheme\u2019s operators, Re-Turn, over the 2.2 c handling fee which retailers receive per can. She said this was not enough for smaller shops to break even, particularly taking into account the cost of machine maintenance.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Senator O\u2019Reilly told the Seanad: \u201cWhen you go to the machine, it can be out of order, it can be full, it can reject perfectly good cans.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cIt\u2019s inconvenient, it\u2019s frustrating and it\u2019s an unnecessary torture. The only winners of this is Re-turn and their successful money-making business under the pretence of concern for the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Ms Orme told the committee: \u201cWe have very real concerns that there will be an exodus of containers from the South to the North once their scheme gets up and running.\u201d<\/p>\n

She has predicted that this will affect Re-Turn\u2019s target for a090 per cent recycling rate in the South by 2029, adding it would particularly impact \u201cour members along the border areas who have these machines and operating costs,\u201d and that there would potentially now be less cans going through them.<\/p>\n

It came as it was revealed that the UK scheme will involve a deposit of 20p (23c) for every container returned \u2013 almost 10 cent more than the 15c currently available to consumers for small items through the Re-Turn scheme here.<\/p>\n

\n

Ms Orme added: \u201cIf you have groups of people collecting cans and they suddenly realise they\u2019re worth 15 cent in the South, but they\u2019re worth more in the North, of course you\u2019re going to go across the border.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In response, chief regulatory officer with return, Gill McCann, said that country-specific barcodes could only be redeemed in one jurisdiction, which would \u201cmitigate the amount of movement across the border.\u201d<\/p>\n

More than \u20ac120 million was left unredeemed in the first two years of the Re-Turn scheme, CEO Ciaran Foley confirmed this week \u2013 as customers did not bring back empty bottles and cans to claim their deposit. Mr Foley admitted that the scale of the shortfall came to \u20ac66.7 million in 2024 and \u20ac60 million in 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a case that we are sitting on all of that,\u201d he told Fine Gael TD John Clendennan at the committee, saying that a lot of the figure had been spent on VAT and paying back loans that helped start the scheme.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Senator Sarah O\u2019Reilly was critical of the scheme\u2019s finances.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cIt isn\u2019t a tax that can be used for disability services and schools. It is money collected by a private company which means CEO salaries, budgets for advertising and marketing. If you don\u2019t get your deposit back, they keep your deposit, so essentially it\u2019s a tax. That amounted to \u20ac66million last year,\u201d said the Cavan Senator.<\/p>\n

She added: \u201cThere has been a flurry of positive articles praising the scheme lately. Tucked away within them, is a proposal to suggest the fee should be increased.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThey are slowing paving the way for people to pay even more to buy a can. There is a lack of innovation in this country, where the answer to everything is to hike up prices for consumers.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThe Irish Waste Management Association has made it clear, bottles in the household bins are recycled to the same standards as those returned through the scheme.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf recycling is already effective through our household bins, let\u2019s stop pretending that increasing charges is the only way forward. Meanwhile, the Re-turn CEO Ciaran Foley\u2019s salary is still not publicly known.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThe real environmental impact is reducing the number of single use drinks containers, and this scheme does not do that.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we are serous about the environment, we would target manufacturers instead of consumers, who are always the ones to lose out,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

The Committee this week also heard that Re-Turn employs 59 staff, and that \u20ac1.1 million was paid to the top five executives last year, including pension contributions.<\/p>\n

Independent TD Barry Heneghan asked whether a pay freeze for senior management could be considered, adding: \u201cYou\u2019re telling over 1,000 CSNA members that you can\u2019t raise the 2.2 cent handling fee. How can you justify that order of priorities to a shopkeeper?\u201d<\/p>\n

However, Re-Turn chair Tony Keohane insisted that salaries were to ensure that \u201cwe attract the right people\u201d to run the scheme, and that additional supports would be considered for retailers who feel they are losing money.<\/p>\n

It was also confirmed that \u20ac4.6 million was spent on marketing by Re-Turn in 2024, rising to \u20ac6.8 million last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An Aont\u00fa senator has described the Re-turn deposit scheme as \u201can unnecessary torture\u201d \u2013 and says that she…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":579193,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,246375,46093,18,440,19,17,166184,2375,3311,246376,226143],"class_list":["post-579192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-deposit-return","tag-deposit-return-scheme","tag-eire","tag-environment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-oireachtas-committee","tag-recycling","tag-return","tag-return-scheme","tag-senator-sarah-oreilly"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579192"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579192\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/579193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}