Australian supermarket workers have found themselves at the front line of an angry consumer backlash over moves to ban single-use plastic bags, with a vocal minority abusing cashiers and one customer wrapping his hands around an employee’s throat, union officials said yesterday.
Retail giants Woolworths and Coles, which account for about 70 percent of the Australian supermarket trade, last month announced new goals to reduce plastic products and packaging in response to customers wanting a greener shopping experience.
However, their employees’ union — Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees’ Association — said some customers had reacted badly to free single-use plastic bags being replaced by A$0.15 (US$0.11) reusable bags.
One customer took his anger over a lack of free plastic bags out on a female worker at a Woolworths supermarket at the west coast city of Mandurah on June 22, the union’s Western Australia assistant secretary Ben Harris said.
“He came up behind her and put his hands around her throat,” Harris said. “I don’t know how much pressure he applied, but any physical contact is inappropriate and especially if it’s from behind, I imagine it’s particularly intimidating.”
Woolworths announced last week that their reusable bags would be given away for free for 10 days until this coming Sunday while customers got used to the absence of single-use bags. Coles introduced its single-use bag ban from Sunday.
Queensland Environment Minister Leeanne Enoch said that customers taking their own bags would soon become second nature.
The union said customers are pressuring staff to overload the reusable bags so fewer are required.
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