Draft REACH (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2026
(2 days, 17 hours ago)
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The Chair
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Hon. Members may remove their jackets, if they are brave enough to do so.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Emma Hardy)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft REACH (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2026.
I am delighted to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger, and I welcome all hon. Members to the Committee. The draft regulations were laid before this House on 24 March. I will go through them in detail, but in short, all they will do is move six dates to enable us to finish the alternative transitional registration model; amend UK REACH, which is a central part of the framework governing the safe use of chemicals in Great Britain; and amend the dates by which businesses must submit information to the Health and Safety Executive on chemicals that they manufacture and place on the market.
UK REACH retains the core principles of the EU system, including its fundamental aim of ensuring a high level of protection for human health and the environment. I want to be clear from the outset that nothing in these draft regulations will change its aims or reduce its protections; they will just move six dates and make two key changes.
The first change will extend the deadline from article 127P by which registrants—that is, manufacturers and importers—must submit information on their chemicals to the HSE. Our EU exit transitional arrangements were put in place to support a smooth and orderly move to the UK regime, including later deadlines to submit complete registration data. Under the current system, the deadlines fall on 27 October 2026, 27 October 2028 and 27 October 2030. The most hazardous and highest-tonnage substances come first. The draft regulations will extend those deadlines to 27 October 2029, 27 October 2030 and 27 October 2031 respectively. These provisions apply to all substances that were already on the EU market at the time of EU exit.
I recognise that these deadlines have previously been extended, so let me address directly why we need to extend them further. In 2023, the then Government extended the deadlines because of transitional challenges, especially the considerable cost to the industry of acquiring the information required, usually from former EU partners. This allowed for the exploration of an alternative transitional registration model. The aim was a fair and workable system for all stakeholders. Since the election, this Government have reassessed our broader chemicals policy while we have completed exploration of the ATRm. This reflects our improved relationship with the European Union, but clearly the ATRm cannot be implemented in time for the first transitional registration deadline of 27 October 2026. As a result, it is necessary to extend the deadlines once more to ensure a robust and effective policy framework. This extension will avoid imposing significant and unnecessary costs on industry while we complete the development of a more proportionate and effective transitional model.
Following a consultation in 2024, we published our approach to the ATRm on 30 March 2026, providing long-awaited clarity for industry. It will reduce the data that businesses must submit for UK REACH registration. The ATRm aims to cut by about 70% the one-off industry costs of transitional registration, but it also maintains the important protections that UK REACH provides. It recognises that companies that place chemicals on the GB market are responsible for managing the risks to human health and the environment, including harmful effects arising from their hazardous properties or how they are used in this country. Registration therefore remains key to ensuring that businesses understand and properly manage those risks in Great Britain.
The extension of the deadline is to give us the extra time needed to finalise and implement the ATRm in a proportionate and workable way in the GB market. It will also give businesses the certainty that they need to plan for compliance, and will maintain continuity in important supply chains.
We are acting decisively by bringing forward ATRm legislation so that the industry knows what it needs to do in good time for the new deadlines. Without the extension, businesses would have to meet the existing deadlines and submit the full registration requirements currently in UK REACH. The industry would face the full estimated £2 billion costs, when we have made clear this Government’s intention to remove them. I believe that that would be as unacceptable to this Committee as it is to the Government.
The second change in the draft regulations is to the deadlines by which HSE must complete compliance checks on 20% of registration dossiers. The compliance check deadlines will thereby remain aligned with the revised registration submission deadlines; otherwise, HSE will have to complete checks before the relevant data is even submitted. Under the draft regulations, the deadlines for compliance checks will move to 27 October 2030, 27 October 2032 and 27 October 2036—I should have asked why 27 October, shouldn’t I? That will remain a mystery, but the time between the registration deadline and the related compliance checks deadline will remain unchanged.
As with the previous amendment to UK REACH, made using a power in the Environment Act 2021, we have followed the safeguards set out in schedule 21 to that Act. We have worked closely with the devolved Governments in Scotland and Wales, who have given their consent for this instrument. We have consulted publicly to ensure that stakeholders have had the opportunity to provide views and evidence.
We have published a statement confirming that the amendments are consistent with the overarching aims of UK REACH. We have also published an impact assessment, which demonstrates that extending the deadline will reduce unnecessary costs to businesses while maintaining an effective regulatory framework; it builds on the options assessment published in March 2026, which the Regulatory Policy Committee rated as fit for purpose.
The territorial extent of the draft regulations is the United Kingdom. The devolved Governments are engaged in their development and are content. The Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments has formally considered them without comment.
The draft regulations will ensure that UK REACH continues to operate effectively during the transition to a more proportionate registration model. They will maintain high standards of protection for human health and the environment while giving industry the time and certainty to comply in a way that avoids unnecessary cost and disruption.
Robbie Moore (Keighley and Ilkley) (Con)
The draft regulations will extend the current legislative deadlines for registration to submit information to the Health and Safety Executive under UK REACH. They will also extend the period during which downstream users and distributors who were importing from the EU before the end of the EU exit implementation period can continue to import chemicals from the EU without submitting a full registration. The official Opposition support this measure, because ultimately it seeks to serve businesses and save them money by extending deadlines.
The deadlines have already been extended twice, both times by the previous Administration: first in 2020, then in 2023. The Opposition agree that extending the deadlines further via the draft regulations will provide sufficient time for the Government to develop and introduce a new transitional registration model to cover registrations of substances that were already on the EU market at the time of EU exit. This approach aims to reduce industry costs significantly.
We welcome the findings of the impact assessment, which concludes:
“This policy is not expected to negatively affect businesses of any size.”
It also notes that the cost savings from discounted terms could benefit small and micro businesses “less proportionately” than larger businesses, and that this is
“due to shorter extensions linked to later deadlines for smaller tonnages.”
Of the 3,195 registered businesses in the chemical sector, 3,125—some 98%—are small, medium-sized and micro businesses, as the impact assessment outlines.
Although we support the draft regulations, I acknowledge that there has been some third-party concern about the impact of the proposed changes and the risk of divergence from the EU in this policy area, as noted by Wildlife and Countryside Link, which stated its concerns in a formal submission to the House of Lords Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. I hope that the Minister can assure those organisations that have concerns that divergence from EU regulations will occur only when there is a convincing and compelling case for it, and not simply for its own sake. We will support this delegated legislation.
Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. I will endeavour not to detain hon. Members longer than is necessary.
I thank the Minister for her opening remarks and for clearly making the case for extending the submission deadline for chemicals registered for EU REACH. I agree that allowing more time for Government and industry to get this right strikes the right balance, particularly given that the vast majority of substances were previously registered under EU REACH and have established and well-understood risk management measures in place.
As the Minister will undoubtedly be aware, Mid Cheshire is arguably the birthplace of the UK chemicals industry. Brunner, Mond and Company was established in Northwich in 1873 and was one of the four main companies that merged to create ICI. It was in Northwich that polyethylene was discovered, and the chemicals we produce today at Lostock works are critical to maintaining our clean water supply.
The chemicals industry has welcomed the recent support from the Chancellor in the form of the £350 million critical chemicals resilience fund. Nevertheless, a £2.5 billion regulatory burden was created by the previous Government’s chaotic departure from the European Union and consequently from the EU REACH scheme. That needs to be addressed. My constituents voted to leave the EU, but I sincerely doubt that a single one of them did so because they yearned to be free of the yoke of European chemical hazard registration requirements. Turning to her husband on 24 June 2016, Mrs Trellis of Winsford did not say, “Finally, Brian, our great country can now diverge from the EU on registration and management of the risk of hazardous chemicals.” But leave we did, and that decision has had consequences for companies in my constituency.
Last year, I visited Indaver, a company with a site in Middlewich that specialises in the recycling of chemicals. A key issue that it has raised involves the registration requirements for chemicals after they have been recycled. Prior to Brexit, when a chemical or molecule was registered under REACH in the EU, recycling processes would not trigger the need for re-registration. This assumed that the chemical’s identity and structure remained unchanged during recycling, allowing the same registration to be used for both the original and the recycled material. Post Brexit, even if the molecular structure of recycled chemicals remains unchanged, UK companies are required to re-register those chemicals with the EU REACH scheme before they can sell or distribute them within the EU market.
In contrast, EU-based companies continue to operate under the previous system, under which re-registration of recycled chemicals is not required. The clear regulatory disparity that has been created is not only time-consuming, but costly, as it involves new testing, documentation and potentially lengthy approval timelines. For Indaver, this means that recycled chemicals must undergo the same rigorous procedures as new chemicals, despite no changes having been made to their chemical composition. These added costs and administrative burdens place UK businesses at a significant competitive disadvantage, especially in comparison with their EU counterparts that can bypass the process.
I know that the Minister’s Department continues to work to develop UK REACH, and I recognise that this is the situation that she has inherited and that she has a responsibility to make the system work. However, I ask her to consider whether, given the importance of regulatory alignment between EU REACH and UK REACH, mutual recognition of these schemes can be made a priority as part of future negotiations over our relationship with the EU. Ensuring consistency and mutual recognition of registrations would not only support local businesses, but foster fair competition and facilitate smoother trade between the UK and the EU.
Tessa Munt (Wells and Mendip Hills) (LD)
The Liberal Democrats support the principle of reducing unnecessary bureaucracy and avoiding costly duplication for businesses in the UK REACH regime. We recognise the challenges that businesses face in complying with post-Brexit chemicals regulations, and we understand the need to develop a more proportionate and workable registration system.
The draft regulations will provide businesses with additional time to compile and submit complex chemical safety information while the Government develop their alternative transitional registration model. Given the significant costs and administrative burdens that the current system can impose on businesses, we support measures that avoid unnecessary regulatory burdens while maintaining existing environmental and public health protections. We will therefore support the draft regulations, but we urge the Government to move more quickly to deliver their replacement registration model and provide long-term certainty for businesses, regulators and consumers.
The Chair
I do apologise; I was under the impression that the hon. Lady was speaking from the Back Bench, but I take it from her opening remark that she was speaking for the Liberal Democrats.
The Chair
Had I known, I would have done the hon. Lady the courtesy of calling her to speak as a Front Bencher.
Emma Hardy
I thank all Committee members for their support and their contributions. UK REACH is a complex but important framework that underpins how we regulate chemicals to protect human health and the environment while supporting industry and trade.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Cheshire made an important point about the chemicals industry. Recent events have highlighted the importance of the chemicals industry and how essential it is to everything in the United Kingdom, including water. That is why I was so keen to work with the industry to make things as easy for them as possible.
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that the situation that he describes is an inevitable result of leaving the EU in the way we did. My constituency also voted to leave, but at none of the doors that I knocked on did anyone say that that was because they did not like the transitional arrangement for chemicals regulation, either, although maybe somebody somewhere did. Under UK REACH, recovered substances do not need to be registered if they meet certain conditions, one of which is that recovery must take place within the EU, so my hon. Friend is completely right.
Let me quickly set out where we are trying to go. We have published a document on the new approach to ensure that regulators and regulation support the growth action plan, and in the environment improvement plan we want to make greater use of regulatory decisions made by like-minded jurisdictions, particularly the EU. To support that, we are looking to reform UK REACH so that we can apply protections that address chemical pollution more quickly and efficiently and in a way that is more aligned with our closest trading partners, especially the EU, by December 2028. We will take regulatory decisions in accordance with that reform unless there is a compelling reason to diverge—and it would have to be compelling. We will assess and, where appropriate, add substances to the authorisation list and will update the candidate list. Drawing from regulatory decision making in other jurisdictions does not change the importance of registration by GB companies, but it is a sensible way to conduct trade with our nearest and closest neighbours.
In response to the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley, we are committed to closer alignment with EU REACH and we will ensure that divergence occurs only when it is compelling. We are currently defining the specific circumstances under which exemptions from EU alignment may be considered for UK REACH. We will publicly consult on those proposals, so I urge everybody to submit their thoughts.
The changes that we are introducing under the draft regulations are simply an amendment to the deadlines to enable that work and that public consultation to take place. They will not reduce our high levels of protection for human health, but they will make things easier for businesses. I thank everyone for their support, and I commend the draft regulations to the Committee.
Question put and agreed to.