There will be no plastic at next year’s Lincoln Christmas market following a landmark vote by the city’s council last night.
At a meeting on 24th September, Councillor Lucinda Preston put forward the motion to ban single-use plastic in the city of Lincoln, which was passed unanimously by its council.
Councillor Preston, the Carholme Labour sustainability advocate, put forward the objective to ban all single-use plastic in the city after the council’s climate emergency declaration earlier in the year.
The main aim of the motion was to have a completely plastic-free Christmas market in 2020, giving the city a year to work towards creating a cleaner environment.
At the beginning of the meeting, Councillor Preston said there should be ‘collective action to make a change’.
Cllr Preston’s motion was seconded by the leader of the council, Councillor Ric Metcalfe, who said ‘it was an excellent motion’.
He spoke of the horrors he had seen in David Attenborough’s Blue Planet and described to the councillors the dangers of increasing micro-plastics in oceans, seas and rivers.
Within the public viewing gallery, there were a group of supporters from Plastic Free Lincoln. They cheered as every council member raised their hand in favour of leading Lincoln to being a more environmentally friendly city and to ban single-use plastics at the 2020 Christmas market.
The declaration of the climate emergency in Lincoln came in summer 2019 alongside the University of Lincoln’s own promise to be more environmentally aware.