A victory for the ACCC against ALDI for 'flushable' wipes

The ACCC has announced that it has completed its investigation into ALDI’s ‘flushable’ wipes products and will take no further action after ALDI stopped selling its personal hygiene wipes and removed potentially misleading claims from its bathroom cleaning wipes packaging.

Peter Hadfield at Sydney Water said: “Sydney Water commends the investigation by the ACCC and the resulting action by ALDI to remove the ‘flushable’ branded wipes products from sale.

“The news that ALDI has now advised the ACCC that not only has it removed the word ‘flushable’ from its bathroom cleaning wipes, ALDI has added the instruction ‘do not flush’ to their packaging, is most welcome.

“Sydney Water’s award-winning campaign to ‘keep wipes out of pipes’ has sparked a broader conversation about what should and shouldn’t be flushed down the toilet.

“Blockages caused by bathroom products has been a big issue for water utilities and their customers across Australia for several years. It’s costing the community millions of dollars every year to deal with the issues that these products cause in the wastewater system and the resulting environmental impacts they can create.

“We now call on the rest of the wipes manufacturing and retail industry to quickly follow this position and withdraw from sale ‘flushable’ branded wipes and to include prominent ‘do not flush’ messaging on the packaging of their bathroom products,” said Hadfield.

ACCC Chairman Rod Sims said: “We’re pleased that ALDI has added a ‘do not flush’ message for consumers making it clear that the bathroom cleaning wipes it is still selling should be disposed of in a rubbish bin instead of a toilet. We welcome their action in addressing our concerns.”