As of Jan. 1, 2022, Vancouverites are now paying 25 cents for every paper cup at fast food restaurants, 15 cents for every paper take-out bag, and Mayor "McCheese" Kennedy Stewart may be laughing all the way to the next election as a result.
The fees are lumped in with the newly-implemented ban on plastic bags, and they're meant to try to discourage people from using these single-use items by penalizing them for it.
The money collected for cups and bags goes directly to the businesses.
Yes, you read that right. The cash collected from the fees for single-use paper items does not go into some fund to help make our city greener. It goes into the pockets of the people who are charging the consumers for the items, at a healthy markup.
The fees being tacked onto nearly every fast food meal sold in the city will equal a windfall for fast food restaurants as most (if not all) of them don't allow you to bring your own cup anyway, and they likely never will.
For example, the automated pouring system at McDonald's drive-thrus (which is a system used globally) makes it impossible for them to put pop into to-go cups, even if they wanted to. This system won't change because of an ill-conceived policy our municipal government threw together.
However the move might not hurt the mayor's chances of getting re-elected this coming October, and it might even help. Though he has already been fundraising and campaigning for the past year and a half, he may get a bump from owners of fast food franchises in Vancouver who he's giving a financial boost to.
Stewart has already got the endorsement from the Vancouver and District Labour Council for 2022, but he may also get the coveted endorsement from the Canadian Franchisee Association.
Every franchise owner in the city owes him a huge favour as he and his council will be putting hundreds of thousands of your dollars into their pockets over the coming years - one paper cup and take-out bag at a time.
