“They are a clean stream, unlike kerbside bins and are easily being sold on the resource market.”

Loading

The Andrews government has baulked at reintroducing a container deposit scheme, opting instead to launch on Tuesday a $37 million support package for the recycling sector, including an education campaign for households.

The package is an attempt to help revive the moribund local industry for making recycled products from waste.

On Tuesday, Environment Minister Lily D’Ambrosio said the Victorian government was still monitoring the performance of container deposit schemes in other states, particularly NSW, to "fully understand" how it would affect recycling markets here.

She said the NSW government had rushed into its scheme without understanding the infrastructure required to provide recycling facilities close to consumers' homes.

The Victorian Greens are also pushing for a container deposit scheme, proposing a model in which the beverage industry would fund the program through their product sales.

The NSW scheme had created "massive confusion", she said.

The Greens estimate the government would need to kick in $5 million in the first year and $2 million in the second, with the scheme generating a surplus from year two.

Shadow Environment Minister Nick Wakeling said, “whilst this idea sounds good in theory, all evidence to date suggests that it will be consumers who will end up being out of pocket”.

Victoria’s opposition does not support a container deposit scheme.

Pat Cash was a spokesperson for the Cash for Cans scheme in 1987.

In NSW, the average price per container has gone up about 15 cents since the scheme was introduced last year.

But in an online poll of 503 Victorians, conducted in the last week of June by Ipsos on behalf of advocacy group the Total Environment Centre, 84 per cent of Victorians responded yes when asked if the state should introduce a deposit and refund scheme for drink bottles and cans.

Just seven per cent said they were against it, and nine per cent said they were unsure.

Deakin University recycling expert Trevor Thornton backed the introduction of a container deposit scheme in Victoria.

Dr Thornton said South Australia’s deposit system, introduced more than 40 years ago, had been highly successful in collecting bottles and cans.

“It really has brought those items out of the waste stream fairly significantly and reduced litter as well,” he said.