Draft Radio Equipment (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2023

Kevin Hollinrake Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd February 2023 General Committees

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Kevin Hollinrake)]

I beg to move,

That the Committee has considered the draft Radio Equipment (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2023.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Maria. The purpose of the instrument is to give effect to Commission delegated regulation (EU) 2019/320 in Northern Ireland and enable it to be legally enforced. The radio equipment directive is an EU directive that requires that radio equipment placed on to the EU market or put into service in the EU must meet specified essential requirements. The directive also allows the Commission to put additional essential requirements on manufacturers of radio equipment.

Radio equipment is defined as any electrical product that emits or receives radio waves for the purposes of radio communication. That includes products such as mobile phones and smartphones. The UK’s Radio Equipment Regulations 2017 implemented the radio equipment directive in UK law, and they have been amended to reflect the fact that we have left the European Union. The Radio Equipment Regulations 2017 apply across the UK, but some of the provisions apply differently in Northern Ireland because, as we know, it remains subject to EU law for radio equipment under the terms of the Northern Ireland protocol.

In December 2018, the Commission issued delegated regulation (EU) 2019/320, which added to the essential requirements in the directive and required that smartphones must be able to transmit their location data in calls to emergency services. The instrument will therefore put in place the additional requirement for smartphones, as required under the delegated regulation in Northern Ireland, and enable it to be legally enforced there. The amendment is required under the terms of the protocol.

I will explain what the SI does in more detail. It adds the caller location requirements of EU regulation 2019/320 to the essential requirements in the Radio Equipment Regulations 2017 as they apply to Northern Ireland. The essential requirements set the overall objectives for how radio equipment must be constructed before it can be placed on the market. Because the SI adds to the essential requirements, it extends the scope of an existing offence in the Radio Equipment Regulations for manufacturers in relation to non-compliance with the essential requirements when placing products on the market.

Failure to comply with the new regulatory requirement will be a criminal offence in Northern Ireland. However, we envisage that it will be only in very rare circumstances. Enforcement authorities will continue to take a proportionate approach to compliance and enforcement activities. They will prioritise working with businesses to help them understand their obligations and support them to comply.

The European Commission’s assessment in its explanatory memorandum published in 2018 was that a technical solution incorporating global navigation satellite systems, or GNSS, and wi-fi signal-based information has already been anticipated by the market, and is now available in over 95% of all smartphones. The Commission’s assessment was that the impact on smartphone manufacturers was therefore anticipated to be minimal, as nearly all new smartphones have the required capability. The EU Commission engaged with industry during the development of the regulation. It has been adopted by the EU since 2019, and we are not aware of any concerns from smartphone manufacturers in relation to these regulations.

My excellent officials in the Office for Product Safety and Standards will be providing online industry guidance to ensure businesses have all the information they need on how to comply with the regulations. They are also liaising with the Northern Ireland district councils that are responsible for enforcing the Radio Equipment Regulations there, and ensuring they have all the necessary information to do so.

We are not currently considering introducing a similar requirement for Great Britain, for two main reasons. First, as the European Commission’s assessment for the regulation shows, nearly all new smartphones currently on the market already have the technical capabilities that it requires. Given the existing widespread adoption, we see no reason to mandate this requirement through legislation. Secondly, now that we have left the European Union, we will make our decisions on product safety regulations based on what is in the best interests of the UK.

We note that the Commission’s policy for this regulation is to provide better information to the EU’s emergency services and to promote the EU’s global navigation satellite system. Given that, we do not think there are strong policy reasons for implementing this change across Great Britain, but we will keep this position under review.

The UK is required to implement this regulation in Northern Ireland under the current terms of the Northern Ireland protocol. The SI does that by amending the UK’s Radio Equipment Regulations 2017 and enabling it to be legally enforced, so I urge the Committee to approve the SI.

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[Chi Onwurah]

I am glad to see that the hon. Member for Lichfield is as amusing as he always is—even if he is not as accurate as he should be.

The debate has been much livelier than was anticipated—

[Kevin Hollinrake]

And longer.

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[Kevin Hollinrake]

I will try to go through the points raised as quickly as possible. The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central asked whether Government Members consider “regulation” to be a dirty word. The answer is absolutely not. What we do believe, though, is that we should regulate and intervene in markets only when absolutely necessary. That is our position. The rest of the time, the best thing we can do for consumers is allow business to deliver solutions. Competition is the best thing for consumers.

On the incremental increase in cost and the 95% to 100%, I do not know the figure.

I am happy to speak to the OPSS to see whether we have a number. Of course we will keep it under review, as I said in my opening speech.

The principal point raised by the hon. Lady related to resilience, and my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield also made some points. In addition to the EU’s Galileo system, the other main global navigation satellite systems are the United States global positioning system, Russia’s GLONASS and China’s BeiDou navigation satellite system—GNSS is a generic term—so there is resilience. Whenever we in this place are spending taxpayers’ money or deciding whether we should do so, we need to be very careful. Any duplication of spend is an unnecessary and inappropriate way of spending taxpayers’ money. We believe that there is resilience in the system and that manufacturers are already providing a solution in terms of the 95% already covered.

The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central asked why this has been delayed. She will have noticed that quite a lot of legislation has been brought to this place over the past few years, and there are other factors, not least parliamentary drafting time, that have delayed some of the issues we would like to bring forward. But we are here now—that is the important thing.

To respond to the hon. Member for Weaver Vale, the maximum penalty is three months in jail. He asked about exceptional circumstances. This is about consumer detriment and I think that those are the kinds of serious concerns that could be raised. As I have said, we expect enforcement agencies to deal with those in a proportionate manner. It is very difficult to specify the exact situations in which a case may be brought forward, but I think that such cases would be very serious and very rare and that they would relate to consumer detriment.

If the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central does not mind, I will not be drawn on the Northern Ireland protocol, other than to say that we need to make sure that we maintain the delicate political balance in Northern Ireland, about which there are concerns, as she knows.

[Chi Onwurah]

Will the Minister give way?

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[Kevin Hollinrake]

I will not, because I am going to conclude.

I thank the Committee for its consideration of this SI and the very valuable contributions to the debate. I commend the SI to the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.