§ Mr. Peter Bruinvelsasked the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will take steps to ensure that all mattresses on sale in the United Kingdom meet the fire resistance specification developed by the National Bedding Federation.
§ Mr. HowardYes. I welcome this initiative by the National Bedding Federation. By the end of this year the great majority of mattresses on sale in this country will be resistant to ignition by smouldering cigarettes. This advance in safety has been made voluntarily by the industry itself. I have agreed to support it by approving the NBF specification as a sound modern standard for the purposes of the general safety requirement which we shall be introducing in legislation, as foreshadowed in our July 1984 White Paper on the "Safety of Goods" (Cmnd. 9302), as soon as the parliamentary timetable permits. The effect of this approval will be that all suppliers of mattresses, imported as well as made in this country can be confident that they are meeting their legal obligation to supply safe goods if the mattresses pass the British Standard cigarette test. Conversely, if they fail the test they clearly will not provide the level of safety approved by the Government.