Product Regulation and Metrology Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Lansley and Baroness Brinton

Report stage
Wednesday 26th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I know that we are all most grateful to the Minister for what I thought was an extremely helpful response to these important and interesting issues that we have debated in this group.

For my part, in relation to Amendment 3 and the use of “safe”, I agree with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, that the use of “safe” in a Bill that is intended to ensure that products are safe would be most helpful. He will note that Amendment 12 defines “safe” in a similar way—not precisely the same as the Consumer Protection Act does at present—as meaning

“that there is no risk, or no risk apart from one reduced to a minimum”,

so it is not to say that a product has no risk.

The Minister is right that this is about product safety—I completely agree—and identification of risk. I think where the noble Lord, Lord Fox, is coming from is on understanding how risk is identified and so on. I have some sympathy with the points he makes on Amendment 9, but I find it entirely arguable whether the definition of safe in the present legislation and the definition in this Bill are very close to one another. I slightly rest my argument for the Minister, and perhaps his officials, to think about: would it not therefore be helpful to include a provision in Clause 1 saying that products should be safe, meaning that there is no risk or a risk that is reduced to a minimum or mitigated, since that is what the Government intend to do? They are intending that people should be able to say that products are safe; they have just chosen to take the word out of statute. I think it would be rather helpful to put it back in. I rest my case there and will not press it further.

On Amendment 28, the Minister very helpfully said more than he said in Committee, although it was not inconsistent with what he said then. In particular, he gave us a timetable, which, of course, is immensely helpful. It is quite a long one and goes to the end of 2026, but I know how these things grind through the machines. He will find that there is a pressing need for a review of the product liability directive, especially in relation to online marketplaces, not least because the Law Commission identified this as an area for reform of the law in its 14th work programme—and that was something like three years ago. We are not only well out of date but well beyond the point at which a need for action on product liability had been identified. I hope we might keep pressing, alongside the Minister, for the progress that needs to be made in the consultation and subsequent legislation.

I have one more point. On Amendment 26 and the question of period products, I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, that I was wondering about this. I have checked, but if I understand the position correctly, period products are not regarded as medical devices; they are regarded as consumer products. Incontinence pants—disposable body-worn pads—are treated as medical devices by the MHRA. That is a distinction without a difference, one that I do not understand. I think that period products are regarded as medical devices by the Food and Drug Administration in America. Of course, we follow where the European Union’s general product safety regulation has been and the definitions it has put into its own regulations. One area that Ministers might think about is whether it would be more appropriate for these products to be regarded as medical devices and brought under the scope of the regulations.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

I have a very minor and technical point, but I referred to products and not just pants, because the whole line of products has changed. I do not believe that either period or incontinence pants are covered. That is my concern but I thank the noble Lord for his point.

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

I will not argue but there is probably a good basis for thinking about whether—rather than including them in the Bill, I say with great respect to the proposers of Amendment 26—it would be more appropriate to revisit the question of having them covered under the Medicines and Medical Devices Act 2021. I will leave it there.

On the basis of the point that we have reached with Amendment 3, and that the Minister will have heard, at the very least, the argument for the consumer and communications benefit of saying that we are aiming to make products safe, I will leave it in his capable hands and not seek to press this. I beg leave to withdraw Amendment 3.