Recycling madness

When I go to the supermarket I have to pay 5p (recycling tax) on a carrier bag, the government says it's to help with the cost of disposing the plastic which lasts thousands of years. Two points come to mind, one is biodegradable plastic bags have been around for ages, indeed the supermarket I mostly use uses them (so why the tax on those?) they break down in months meaning I can't reuse them like other plastic bags, and two, if recycling is so important why does the supermarket now give me three receipts with every shop instead of one?  There goes a tropical rainforest with loads of unnecessary bits of paper, one receipt would do.