Residential Premises: Product Safety and Fire Risk

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Wednesday 1st November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Main. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick) on securing this debate and my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) on his passion and championing of this matter. I am the chair of the all-party group on home electrical safety and I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

This is the sixth debate we have had on this or closely related subjects since March 2015, when the then Minister, the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles), offered very reassuring words, particularly on counterfeit electrical goods. But those words have proved to be empty, especially when it comes to trading standards helping to prevent products from entering this country. Can they really do that when some trading standards budgets have been cut to £200,000?

We have debated Whirlpool and its tumble dryers and consumer rights, but when are we going to stop debating and start taking action? I have asked numerous questions about legislation, and on paper it appears the legislation is robust. Is it simply not being enforced? Why? Because local trading standards have been decimated by the Government’s austerity policies.

Trading standards police online marketplaces such as eBay and Amazon, which fall short of complying by allowing counterfeit goods to be sold on their sites. The Minister knows that electricity is one of the biggest causes of fires in the home. Clearly, some consumers misuse products that can cause fires, but how many fires have been caused because manufacturers, such as Whirlpool, have refused to take appropriate action? How many are as a result of online sales?

What discussions has the Minister had with the Home Office about fires caused by faulty electrical goods? What is the strategy to cope with it? Where is the “fire kills” campaign? It has been very quiet recently. The Minister has been co-operative in her approach and has been willing to meet and engage on the issue, but what is the way forward now? The Lynn Faulds Wood review, which had excellent recommendations, is being ignored. We have had a working group and a recent report, but what is happening now? When will the Government stop having reviews and working groups and start taking action? How many more fires and incidents involving white goods and substandard and counterfeit products do we need to have before the Government take the right measures?

We need a public body that protects consumers, such as the Food Standards Agency. I firmly believe that such a body would not only protect consumers, but act as a central point for co-ordination.

I recently met Apple as I wanted to understand the issues with counterfeit mobile phone chargers, especially when I have seen them myself. Apple informed me that it has a particular issue with Amazon, which it alleges is selling counterfeit Apple products. I am looking forward to Electrical Safety First’s report, due shortly, which will highlight how unsafe counterfeit chargers really are.

In the interests of fairness, I met Amazon yesterday, who tried to reassure me on what it is doing to prevent counterfeit electrical goods from being sold on its site. I put to it Apple’s accusation that it had been directly selling on its site counterfeit Apple products: a matter, I understand, that has been the subject of a lawsuit in the United States. In the UK, consumers are confused. How do they know that an Apple product is an Apple product when they buy on these sites? It is unacceptable and the Minister needs to look at online sales urgently. Perhaps a conversation with Amazon and Apple would be beneficial.

Although I have concerns about some of Amazon’s selling practices, it is not all bad; I believe that it has a good product recall strategy. It holds the appropriate information to recall products quickly and effectively. However, I do not believe that the service extends to notifying customers who have bought counterfeit products. If global companies are engaged in disputes about whether counterfeit goods are being sold, what chance does the consumer have of identifying counterfeit products online? The potential risk to their homes and families is too important for such a speculative approach.

I reiterate my previous call for a dedicated operation to identify counterfeit and substandard goods—something similar to Operation Jasper. It is, I accept, important to tackle counterfeit handbags and clothing; but they do not kill people. Electrical goods are different, and the consequences can be devastating and tragic. Given those serious concerns, will the Minister give a cast-iron guarantee today that she will now consider a full-scale operation to tackle online sales of electrical products? I know that she will attend a meeting of the all-party group in December, but in the meantime will she meet me and a delegation of manufacturers that are victims of online electrical counterfeiting? That will enable her to understand their problems. Consumers deserve our protection, and they deserve to be safeguarded.