Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-12-15-Speech-1-146"
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"en.20081215.16.1-146"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, President-in-Office of the Council, ladies and gentlemen, we have demonstrated several times that we explicitly opt for a high level of consumer protection within the internal market. Both in the multi-annual programme on consumer protection and in the resolution and the debate further to the withdrawal from the market of unsafe, mainly Chinese toys, we have made passionate pleas for the protection of the smallest and most vulnerable consumers, namely children, to be placed high on the agenda.
As rapporteur for the new Toy Safety law, I am therefore delighted to be able to announce that we will probably be able to get a new and strict directive on toy safety pushed through in the next few days – if everything goes according to plan, that is.
I would like to thank the Commission, because it responded to our call to propose a new directive. I would also like to thank the draftsmen of the opinions, the shadow rapporteurs, the president and the members of the Committee on Internal Market and Consumer Protection for the excellent cooperation that made it possible to approve my report unanimously on 6 November. Moreover, I am indebted to the Council, the Commission and all our members of staff for their unwavering dedication and their constructive attitude, which have enabled us to finish this important piece of consumer legislation within the space of ten months.
Ladies and gentlemen, we have various reasons to be proud of our work. The toy safety requirements are undoubtedly being improved and tightened, which is what the public expect from us. There will, in principle, be a ban on the use of carcinogenic, mutagenic and reprotoxic substances in permitted toy components. In addition, stricter rules will be introduced for unavoidable traces of heavy metals. This will be achieved not just by introducing maximum values for more types of substances, but also by establishing much stricter limit values for unavoidable traces of lead, cadmium, mercury, chromium 6 and organic tin.
Another totally new aspect is the provisions covering allergenic fragrances, to which, surely, we do not want children to be exposed. This aspect will also be made tighter than the Commission proposal; eventually, there will be a ban on no fewer than 55 allergenic fragrances, and 11 others will only be allowed for use if accompanied by warning labels. Subject to labelling and consistency with other relevant legislation, we are somewhat more lenient in the case of educational aromatic and flavour games.
A further important point is the improvement of rules to prevent possible suffocation, clarification of the essential safety requirements and, totally new, rules for toys in sweets. The system of warnings will also be extended and reinforced, and these should not only be clearly displayed in a language which the consumer can understand, but also be visible at the place of sale; finally, we are giving the precautionary principle its rightful place in the law.
Rules are of no value, of course, unless they are enforced. This is guaranteed by integrating the new policy in the new goods package, and by introducing stricter dossier requirements and requirements in the area of traceability. This should also be followed up, though. This is why, Commissioner, I would ask you on behalf of Parliament, when monitoring the directive, to pay close attention to the way in which the Member States carry out their supervisory task, both within and outside of the country’s boundaries. For complete peace of mind, we would also like to hear you confirm that new, stricter, harmonised standards will be developed in terms of the noise standards for toys, both peak and sustained noise, and we would ask the same for books made of paper and cardboard only, for which there is no legal certainty at the moment.
Finally, we have explicitly decided against a system of third-party certification in respect of toys that comply with the standards. We have had long discussions on this topic, but a majority was against it. Here too, we should like to hear the Commissioner confirm that, during monitoring, specific attention will be paid to this aspect. We can therefore expect the conformity assessment procedures to land on our desks at some stage."@en1
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