HC Deb 30 January 1985 vol 72 cc267-8
6. Mr. Chapman

asked the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will list the organisations which he has consulted about his proposed new draft regulations concerning the safety of child buggy pushchairs.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Mr. Alex Fletcher)

The consultation documents on the proposed new safety regulations for pushchairs are available in the Library. They include a full list of those consulted.

Mr. Chapman

Recognising the deficiencies in the existing regulations, will my hon. Friend say when he hopes to introduce the new regulations? Considering the serious, albeit few, accidents that there have been with the collapsible type child buggy pushchair, can he reiterate that that form of perambulator comes within the scope of the existing regulations?

Mr. Fletcher

On the second point, I can confirm that the existing regulations apply to buggies, and they will be covered also in the new ones. On the first point, the regulations will come into effect later this year.

Mr. Williams

Will the Parliamentary Under-Secretary bear in mind that when the regulations were introduced in September 1978, after the death of children, they were described as the first step? Why are we still waiting for the second step six and a half years later? Has he read Which? magazine, which carried out a survey in 1982 and found that five of the 20 pushchairs that it checked were unsafe, that half of the owners of the buggy type of pushchair, and a quarter of the owners of the traditional type of pushchair, reported that they had had accidents, and that in one in 20 of those accidents a child had been injured?

Mr. Fletcher

I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman's points. We are making new regulations to BSI standards, which will be put into practice as soon as possible.