> metal/glass straws are inconvenient and require washing
Boohoo. Don't use a straw then. Out of the billions of beverages consumed during the last 24 hours, it's a given that >95% were consumed without one.
It's also of course an entirely arbitrary line to draw. Are all your plates and bowls at home plastic as well?
In part, the rest of society subsidises the price of cheap disposable items by paying for their disposal and clean-up. I'd much rather that the manufacturers were made to bear that cost, though I doubt that would be practical in a global market. Probably the easiest way to implement it would be to add a cleanup charge to the price of those items (e.g. like VAT).
On a related note, I'd want any branded litter (e.g. McDonalds cartons) to be charged back to the company - it should be their responsibility to deal with the rubbish they produce and they can easily add a small charge to each order.
The Germany municipality of Tübingen implemented a "Verpackungssteuer" (tax on single-use packaging, utensils). It was fought by the local McDonald's franchisee up to the highest relevant court (Bundesverwaltungsgericht) and finally approved.
Dozens of other German municipalities were just waiting for the final decision to implement their own local tax.
They are banned. There is no law that bans just the straws.
> Are all your plates and bowls at home plastic as well?
Funnily enough, there are contingents of people who exclusively use paper plates and plastic cutlery. I think there's an interesting parallel there. Those kinds of people simply do not want the effort and cost of maintenance. I'm not particularly sympathetic to this mindset in either case, but still.