The UK’s product safety regime is to be overhauled to provide better protection for the public and make it “fit for the digital age”, ministers have announced.
But some consumer organisations said they had been warning for years about dangerous goods – from electric heaters to kitchen blenders – being sold online, and urgent action is needed now instead of further delay.
Announcing a consultation, the government said it wanted to update the UK’s product safety laws, some of which date back more than 30 years. Ministers want to bring laws in line with the way people shop now and ensure they take account of 21st century innovations such as internet-connected devices and artificial intelligence.
Ministers said much of the current legislation is underpinned by “outdated EU laws” and that, having left the bloc, “the UK can now create its own product safety regime”.
The announcement came less than 24 hours after the British government’s latest climbdown involving proposed post-Brexit changes. It emerged on Tuesday that the UK will retain the EU’s CE product safety mark indefinitely after ministers bowed to pressure from industry and manufacturers.
Announcing the latest product safety review, the government said it was particularly keen to ensure consumers had the same protections when shopping online as on the high street.
In addition to the product safety review, a consultation is also being launched on proposed fire safety rules for domestic upholstered furniture, aimed at improving standards for consumers.
There have been calls for urgent action on unsafe household goods for years. In September 2021, a committee of MPs warned that the UK’s product safety regime was not up to the job of preventing another tragedy like the Grenfell Tower fire – which was started by a faulty fridge freezer – as shopping increasingly moved online and regulators took on new responsibilities after Brexit.
There has been particular concern about gaps in the law which mean that digital firms such as Amazon and eBay are not responsible for the safety of items sold by third parties.
The consumer group Which? said its investigations had consistently uncovered dangerous products being sold on online marketplaces. It added: “Yet the government and OPSS [Office for Product Safety and Standards] have only produced dither and delay when what is needed is urgent action to bring online shopping safety protections up to date”.
Sue Davies, head of consumer rights and food policy at Which?, said: “It’s completely unacceptable for the government to keep kicking the can down the road when dangerous items are ending up in people’s homes every day.
“While promoting UK business is important, to fix the UK’s product safety system the government must quickly establish new regulations that put consumer safety first and enable tough enforcement action against online marketplaces and other businesses that break the rules.”
The groups’s recent warnings include one in February this year about “illegal and dangerous” plug-in mini heaters for sale on online marketplaces.
The charity Electrical Safety First said the government “must act now” to protect the safety of online shoppers and introduce legislation to ensure online marketplaces were not unfairly exempt from safety laws that high street retailers were bound by. It added that the forthcoming king’s speech “is the perfect opportunity to make this happen”.
Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, said: “I am determined to use our post-Brexit freedoms to identify outdated EU laws placing unnecessary burdens on business and reform them to benefit both companies and consumers.”
She added: “These changes will provide better consumer protections while upholding our world-leading safety standards, and will also cut costs for business to ensure they have the freedom they need to innovate and thrive, helping to create jobs and grow the economy.”
