‘Nonsensical’ EPR rules will cost millions, say hospitality businesses

By Andrew Catchpole

Published: 20 March, 2025

Under the umbrella of UKHospitality (UKH), leading pub and hospitality businesses have written to Defra Secretary of State, Steve Reed, pushing back against a significant flaw in the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) scheme.

As it stands, hospitality businesses will be forced to pay a packaging levy twice, with bottles of wine, spirits and beers “incorrectly classified as household waste” and thus being charged for both this status and under the EPR scheme.

This is now beginning to bite and at a time when the hospitality sector is already reeling from numerous headwinds and increased costs.

Read more: Harpers Webinar – A Seat at the Table

In the letter, the signatories (see below) have argued that: “The consequences of the flawed Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) scheme are now being felt by the hospitality sector. Bills from suppliers are now being received, resulting in significant cost increases as a result of EPR.”

This amounts to an additional annual cost of £2000 for large pubs (on top of their existing commercial waste contracts), with medium sized outlets seeing increases of almost £750, and smaller venue impacted by up to £350 per year.

“Hospitality businesses will be forced to pass at least some of the additional cost of this EPR fee onto their customers, as their suppliers have done to them,” the letter continued.

“Hospitality businesses are being double-charged. They are being passed on an EPR charge, levied on a product incorrectly determined as household waste, and they’re also paying for that same product to be disposed of commercially.

“This is nonsensical. EPR is designed to recover costs for the collection of household waste. The vast majority of packaging supplied to hospitality businesses is not leaving the premises and should not be considered as ‘household’ waste.

“Packaging supplied directly from suppliers to hospitality businesses, particularly closed-loop businesses, should not be levied with EPR charges.”

UKH has again stressed the importance of the health of hospitality to the UK economy, with the sector contributing £93 billion annually, generating £54 billion of tax for the Treasury and being the third biggest employer in Britain.

The signatories to the letter are:

• All Our Bars Limited

• Azzurri Group

• Beer and Buns Limited

• Burger King UK

• Cote Restaurant Ltd

• Crerar Hotels

• Eden Hotel Collection

• Elior

• Foundation Group

• The Fulham Shore (The Real Greek and Franco Manca)

• Fuller, Smith & Turner