Draft Child Resistant Packaging (Safety) Regulations 1986

HL Deb 24 April 1986 vol 473 cc1328-32

7.7 p.m.

Lord Lucas of Chilworth rose to move, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 5th March be approved. [15th Report from the Joint Committee.]

The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion which stands in my name on the Order Paper. Notwithstanding the delight that I have that the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, wishes to respond from the Opposition Benches, I wonder whether I may pay my tribute to his noble friend Lord Ennals, who really master-minded what we are considering this evening in taking the initiative in setting up the Child Resistant Closures Working Party, which produced what is known as the Scobie Report and on whose recommendation these regulations are based; because there is no doubt that if your Lordships approve the regulations it will give great comfort to very many people in manufacturing industry and, of course, to the parents of very young children.

The purpose of the regulations is to reduce substantially the total of, unhappily, 10,000 small children who are referred to hospital each year for ingestion or suspected ingestion of household chemicals—substances such as white spirit and paint stripper. I do not have to describe the anxiety and distress that this will save for parents and young children or the desirability of freeing scarce National Health Service resources for treating the sick. Similar measures introduced into the United States have reduced child poisoning by some 30 to 80 per cent., and if we can achieve anything like that here the measure will have been well worthwhile.

The regulations operate by making it an offence to supply to the public the hazardous chemicals set out in the schedule in containers that have not been approved by the British Standards Institute as child resistant to British Standard 6652. The only obvious omission is household bleach, and that omission is as a result of advice that paediatricians have given that it does not cause serious or lasting injury to young children.

The measure is restricted to liquids that can be easily, as I suppose the expression might be, "swigged" by a child while the mother's or father's back is turned, since these present the greatest hazard to young children. Unfortunately, we were unable to make provision for the elderly or disabled, since this would create too large a loophole in safeguarding young children; but the products covered are not such that the elderly or disabled will need to open them in a hurry and unaided.

The cost of initial approvals will be quite high, but spread over time will amount to only 1p or 2p per container, which is, I suggest, a small price to pay for the safety of small children. In order not to create a barrier to trade in the European Community, we will have to accept closures approved by recognised bodies in other member states, but only—and I emphasise this—if they come up to our standards.

We have consulted across the board. The chemicals industry is content. The packaging industry would naturally like the scheme to be slightly less rigorous and would like more time. But we are giving suppliers nearly two years' grace to introduce child-resistant containers, and we do not want small children to be at risk a moment longer than is necessary. The paediatricians whom we have consulted consider that we have got the proposed scheme about right.

Finally, I should emphasise that the first line of defence really must always be parental vigilance. It is for parents in the house to ensure that products of this kind, as indeed with medicines, are kept as far as possible away from children; but this measure which introduces child-resistant closures certainly might be considered to be a long-stop where parental vigilance fails.

I do not think it is necessary for me to go over the regulations paragraph by paragraph: I believe they are self-explanatory. If there are any points noble Lords wish to make of course I should be delighted to answer them to the best of my ability. I therefore commend the regulations to your Lordships' House.

Moved, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 5th March be approved. [15th Report from the Joint Committee.]—(Lord Lucas of Chilworth.)

7.15 p.m.

Lord McIntosh of Haringey

My Lords, it is my pleasure to acknowledge and add my own thanks to those expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, to my noble friend Lord Ennals. It was my noble friend who in 1982 introduced into another place the Dangerous Household Products (Child Safety) Packaging Bill. That was far too long a title but it was a very necessary initiative on his part. It was that Bill which resulted in the child resistant-closure working Party, to which the Minister has just referred. I think it was remarkable that the working party, which consisted of a number of distinguished medical people as well as those interested particularly in child accident prevention, and representing consumers and Members of this House and of another place, was a private working party. It was not actually an official working party sponsored by Government or by any of the major institutions. I understand that the administrative, secretarial and public relations activities were paid for by a grant from the packaging industry and I have pleasure in acknowledging that this initiative, started by my noble friend Lord Ennals and supported financially by the packaging industry, has resulted in a virtual consensus about the steps that need to be taken, in terms of regulation, to deal with this problem of damage to children from swallowing dangerous chemicals in the home and resulting poisoning.

Of course there is no perfect answer to this problem: that has to be recognised. If you make packaging fully child resistant, you are bound to make it more difficult to open for other people, and I believe there have been tests which show that children, who still have an element of lateral thinking which we perhaps have lost, find it is easier to overcome the puzzle of child-resistant packaging, just as young people in their teens are much better at solving Rubik's cube than we are. It could be a problem to have child-resistant packaging which was so difficult that elderly people, for instance with arthritis, might have difficulty in opening the product. However, as the noble Lord has said, none of these is a product which needs to be opened in a hurry. They are household products, and to that extent I am sure the balance is right: in other words, that we should get the packaging made safer as a priority as against a slight inconvenience to elderly people.

There are several particular points which are worth referring to. First, the British Standard which has been quoted deals with difficulty of access to the container. It does not deal with the question of spillage, and if you have been fighting to get something open the risk of spilling some of it afterwards could be that much greater; and some of these products are harmful, or could be harmful, to the skin and to clothing even if they are not swallowed. I wonder whether the noble Lord has any advice to give about that because it leads to my second point, which is the danger involved when products are transferred to other containers, if they are too difficult to get at. For example, if turpentine or white spirit is transferred to a jam jar or if it is transferred to a food or drink container, that is the old case of paraquat in the tool shed in a lemonade bottle, is it not? In that case we may actually be defeating our purpose.

I should like to suggest to the Government that since there is no perfect answer in the form of packaging or of regulations, then these should be accompanied by a programme of education to encourage parents and others living in the home not to succumb to the temptation to transfer dangerous products to other containers but to keep, and continue to keep, dangerous products, even in child-resistant containers, out of the reach of children to minimise the risk of children being left alone in a room where, for example, you leave a paint brush in a jar on the floor after you have been decorating while you go to have a cup of tea. These are the kinds of things where education and propaganda, as well as regulations, are appropriate and relevant

The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, referred to the American experience where there was a reduction of from between 30 and 80 per cent. in cases reported to the hospitals. But I would remind him that the American Act of 1970 was accompanied by an advertising and educational programme which covered a large part of the United States, and the two together seem to me to be a more effective answer to the problem. However, it is clear from what I have said that we on these Benches welcome the regulations, and think that they perform a useful function. We believe, as the noble Lord said, that my noble friend Lord Ennals has chalked up another credit on his long list of public services to the people of this country.

Lord McNair

My Lords, may I say that of course we on these Benches welcome these regulations? May I also, from a position of abysmal ignorance, ask the Minister one question? Do these regulations cover products which are normally used in the garden or do they cover only products used in the kitchen? En passant, the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, referred to paraquat, which you can buy in granular form in a package that any child could undo without the slightest difficulty. I wonder whether this is the subject of some other regulations. Perhaps the noble Lord can answer that question.

Lord Lucas of Chilworth

My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, and the noble Lord, Lord McNair, for their consideration of these regulations. I should like to add to what I said earlier with regard to the noble Lord, Lord Ennals, and to the packaging industry, which has borne the burden of the report that has resulted in these regulations. Without their help, we should not have been able to get so far as we have.

I think that there has to be a general note of warning sounded here; and the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, mentioned this. We can go only so far in these matters. What we are considering here is child restraint closures and not some of the wider issues that one might like to consider. For example, as regards the point about spillage which was made by the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, I do not wish to sound unkind but, in a way, that is irrelevant to the safety of the child. If the child gets into the container and is therefore able to spill it, then the closure itself will have failed the test for approval.

Lord McIntosh of Haringey

My Lords, I was not suggesting that that was the risk of spillage. I was suggesting that if the container, in becoming child resistant, had increased the risk of spillage, the temptation would be for the adult to transfer the liquid to another container. That is the worry that I had about spillage and I think it is relevant to the safety of children.

Lord Lucas of Chilworth

Yes, indeed, my Lords; but I am sure the noble Lord will accept the point I made. Accepting what he said takes me on to his second point, about which I should like to say this. First, we are immensely grateful to the manufacturing and packaging industry for doing so much in regard to general advice to parents, householders and so on, about the storage of products of this nature.

At the end of this year we shall enter into a programme which will be called an awareness campaign of what is meant by child restraint closures. That will also encompass the other general points of advice with regard to the storage of these materials and the recklessness of transferring them into other containers. Several thousand pounds will be expended in this area and we feel that, with general support from agencies which are normally helpful to us, we will get this message across. The awareness campaign will therefore encourage the public to be a little more careful about the storage and use of these hazardous liquids.

The noble Lord, Lord McNair, asked me whether the regulations cover garden chemicals. With his knowledge, I think he will probably understand rather better if he studies the schedule of regulated products. What I can say to him in general terms is yes, but liquid paraquat is not sold retail and it is only products that are sold retail that are covered by these regulations. Obviously, wholesale or trade products that find their way into the home will not be covered, and it is for the suppliers to ensure that they do not offer for sale a product which is known to be used by a retail purchaser. Manufacturers themselves will have to ensure that there is not much spillage from their containers if they are to make their products saleable.

It is interesting that there are a number of companies in competition with each other in regard to the product itself. That competition will undoubtedly be extended towards the packaging and presentation of their products and we believe that, to a great extent, that point will be taken care of. I do not think there is anything else that noble Lords have asked of me. In fact, I do not think there is anything else that I can add to what I have already said. It just remains for me to thank your Lordships and to ask that you approve the regulations.

On Question, Motion agreed to.