§ Mr. Alfred Morrisasked the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will now state what action he proposes to take on the flammability of upholstered furniture, and, in particular, the replacement of standard polyurethane foam in upholstery combinations where it poses an unacceptable safety hazard.
§ Mr. Howard[pursuant to his reply, 7 July 1986, c. 10.]: I would refer the right hon. member to my reply to the hon. Member for Lewes (Mr. Rathbone) on 1 July. The option of reference to a code of practice on match ignitability will offer an advantage over the simple match test requirement, in that it will encourage furniture manufacturers to use safer fillings rather than concentrating on the selection and use of protective cover fabrics.
The proposed code of practice will permit the use of high resilience polyurethane foam (which has better characteristics in its behaviour in fire than does the standard product) in combination with certain covering materials. But some presently popular combinations including standard polyurethane foam filling will not meet the criteria and will therefore not be permitted by the code.