London: The 5p charge for plastic carrier bags, currently levied by supermarkets and large department stores, is to be extended to all retail outlets, including small Indian-owned cornershops.

Figures show the number of bags handed out by the seven main supermarkets fell by 85 per cent from 7 billion a year.This is part of the war on plastics launched on Thursday by the British Prime Minister Theresa May who confirmed that the government will launch a consultation for taxes on single-use plastic items such as disposal coffee cups.

She said that Whitehall would set an example by removing plastic cutlery and cups from central government offices. She hoped employers, too, would consider banning plastic knives and forks in workplace canteens.

May, who was accompanied by her environment secretary, Michael Gove, published her long-awaited 25-year environment plan to reverse declining wildlife and secure clean air and water, reduced flood risk and more efficient resource use.

The plan aims to achieve long-term goals in six areas: clean air, clean and plentiful water, thriving plants and wildlife, a reduced risk of harm from environmental hazards such as flooding and drought, using resources from nature more sustainably and efficiently and enhanced beauty, heritage and engagement with the natural environment.

On the foreign affairs front, developing countries will be given help in tackling pollution, including plastic waste in oceans. British television recently showed tributaries of the Ganges clogged with plastic waste.

The Daily Mail, however, which has been leading a campaign against carrier bags, today commended the Karnataka state government which in March 2016 "introduced a comprehensive ban on the use of plastic by business".

Certainly, attitudes have changed in the last 50 years since the iconic 1967 film, The Graduate, which showed Benjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman), a 21-year-old college graduate, being given kindly advice by a family friend, Maguire (Walter Brooke): "I just want to say one word to you... just one word... Plastics... There is a great future in plastics... will you think about it?"

A documentary which has hardened British sentiment against plastics is Sir David Attenborough's recent documentary on BBC TV, Blue Planet II, which depicted albatross parents unwittingly feeding their chicks plastic and mother dolphins potentially exposing their new-born calves to pollutants through their contaminated milk.

"The future of all life now depends on us," the 91-year-old BBC naturalist said in his closing speech.