plastic bags (Photo : Reuters)
A California law that had already been enacted banning the providing of plastic bags by supermarket stores will now be temporarily suspended reported Al Jazeera.. This was the consequence of a campaign by industry groups against that law that managed to muster enough support to halt its implementation.
Last year California's legislature had passed and Governor Jerry Brow had also approved the law banning the use of plastic bags. This law was to be implemented in phases.
During the initial phase it was to become effective for large retailers such as Wal-mart and Target from July 1 of this year. The ban would then become effective for other retailers starting from July 1, 2016.
The enacted law was being implemented across the government of California. However, plastic industry trade groups, that stand to lose their livelihoods and jobs as a consequence of this law, organized a campaign to stop the implementation of this law.
Under the Californian legal system a group of people or campaign would need the support of 504, 760 supporters to challenge any state law, the LA Times reported. Over the course of the current campaign, the American Progressive Bag Alliance collected over 800,000 signatures in support of their campaign to challenge the law banning plastic bags.
This group then submitted these signatures to the office of the Secretary of State. After studying this matter and counting the votes, the office of the Secretary of State announced that there were enough votes here to stop the implementation of this law. The fate of this law will now be decided by way of a full-fledged referendum in November 2016 in which all citizens of California are to vote.
California is now bracing for another round of intense lobbying by both supporters and critics of this law in the run up to the referendum scheduled for November 2016.
