Detergents (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Wednesday 13th March 2019 Grand Committee

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

I am sorry to interrupt the Minister at this late stage but can I be clear about whether these detergents are subject to REACH regulations? Do they have to go through the REACH system as well? As she probably knows, for the majority of chemicals if more than 1 tonne is exported from or imported into the UK those chemicals are covered by REACH regulations, which lay down a large number of other provisions. Are those included or not? I am sorry if that is an unfair question. I do not need an immediate response.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton]

No question is an unfair question, my Lords.

[Lord Teverson]

But it is a vital question.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton]

It is a very interesting question. They are subject to the REACH regulations, which were mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch. I note her concerns about those regulations. As I am sure she is aware, they will be debated in due course in your Lordships’ House and were already debated in the other place on 25 February. I have a little more information on that issue, but I want to put it into proper context so I will write to the noble Lord.

I return to biodegradability and whether it would be downgraded in future. Whether these detergents and surfactants hang around in the environment for a long time is a very important issue. It is clearly a bad thing because they play havoc with water tension and so on. The Government have set out a vision for a green Brexit, in which environmental standards will be not only maintained but enhanced. The biodegradability criteria in the detergents regulations are essential in avoiding these adverse impacts on the environment. We are obviously mindful that if these are not disposed of properly, they can cause foaming and degrade or assist the eutrophication of rivers, which I believe is not beneficial to organic life.

Trade agreements can cover a range of issues and although the UK will be able to negotiate its own trade deals in the event of no deal, focusing on growth areas for our economy, the UK Government continue to be committed to high environmental standards after EU exit and to maintaining a high degree of continuity with current climate goals, green policies and wider environmental targets. I reassure the noble Baroness that, as I mentioned earlier, any changes to the technical annexes will be done by statutory instrument, and will therefore come before your Lordships’ House. Those sorts of issues would be included within that.

A number of noble Lords touched on the resourcing of the HSE—I had fair wind that this might come up. This issue was noted by the SLSC, but I suspect that it probably got to the stage where it had seen the HSE a number of times and thought, “Hang on a minute, we probably want to do something”. For these instruments, the additional administrative requirement for the HSE is minimal. However, I will commit to trying to get an understanding across the piece about how many additional functions the HSE is being asked to take on, and confirm that it is satisfied with the resources it has. That is only fair, because this one is minimal. I completely understand that but the SLSC has made that point and it is worth following up on.

The issue of fees for the HSE is an interesting one. This is only for derogations, and there has been only one derogation across the EU. The fees for derogations are agreed; there was a consultation with the industry. I could go into great detail about these fees but they are designed to meet the costs of derogations; obviously, we do not expect those to happen very often. A derogation occurs where one is using a detergent for a specific purpose which does not fall within the regulations. It would be highly unlikely nowadays with the biodegradable detergents we have for them to be frequent at all.

I move on to the issue of experts. Noble Lords will be aware that the Health and Safety Executive is a world leader in the regulation of chemicals and will continue to be so following EU exit. It also has the necessary regulatory scientific and technical expertise in-house. However, The Government Chief Scientific Adviser’s Guidelines on the Use of Scientific and Engineering Advice in Policy Making of 2010 state that,

“advice from external sources should be sought whenever necessary”,

and we would of course do so. Sources of research and advice may include: the departments’ own experts and analysts; research and funding councils; expert advisory systems such as the Science Advisory Council and the scientific advisory committees, and research and non-departmental sources. We have a great tradition of science and research in this country, and I remain convinced that we would find the right group of experts for the right problem. As noble Lords will be aware these experts will be used to update the annexes, which will go through the usual process.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, touched on governance. We have been here a few times before—