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HOW TO IGNORE THE MANY UPHOLSTERED ELEPHANTS IN THE ROOM

8/30/2023

I am looking at a fat folder of notes from and about meetings that took place between the Department for Business and a very wide range of stakeholders towards reviewing the Furniture Regulations. They cover a period of 18 months from around December 2010 to June 2011. There are masses of details and suggestions from experts on every aspect of furniture fire safety. They cover many meetings of the main Advisory Group and three sub-groups looking at Traceability, Testing and Definitions.

In his Introduction to the 7 December 2010 meeting of the Advisory Group, Mitchell Leimon (head of the Product Safety Team, now the OPSS, at BIS) said:

"BIS is very keen that this review is a collaborative and open process". And a glance at all these notes confirms that it was indeed. For some years now, however, there has been virtually no collaboration on the furniture regulations. And the new proposals from the OPSS have been largely invented by them at the last moment with little to no reference to any of this good work done so long ago. For example, this meeting note then lists points made so far by the Group (see photo above).

Fourteen years on and NONE of these points has been dealt with, and are mostly not dealt with at all by the new OPSS consultation proposals (although including outdoor furniture fully in scope has now been proposed).

Many of them appear to have completely escaped the OPSS's notice, like "Harmonise test house practices in applying the FFRs' test requirements". In fact the practice continues of furniture manufacturers simply trawling around the test houses, gathering 'fail's until they hit one that scores a 'pass'. The OPSS knows – or rather it should know – that the Food Standards Agency has the power to make test houses give up their logs of tests made in order that they can discover which companies are cheating in this way.

As for "Capture the knowledge of the FFRs while it still exists" – well, I'm quoting here from knowledge that I'm fairly certain has not been capture by the OPSS; buried alive more like!

The point is that many of the people and organisations involved in these meetings are still involved today. So, why aren't they protesting about the incredible lack of progress made since 2011? Why aren't they objecting to all that time and effort they wasted informing the government of what should be changed in the regs?

Well, unfortunately, the OPSS can get away with this because manufacturers and retailers are terrified that if they object, then it will be made apparent to the public that they have knowingly done nothing about preventing customers being poisoned in their own homes at least since 2014 when the government proved the regulations are not effective.

Why does the OPSS want to continue backing safety measures it knows do nothing but poison customers and make fires more toxic? Because the number one motive of civil servants, individually and collectively, is to cover one's back. These new proposals guarantee further long delays by which time all involved at the OPSS in these regulations will have moved on to other jobs and therefore out of the firing line.

As for all this knowledge that has been ignored: well, either the OPSS is in possession of it or it isn't. If the former, then why aren't they sharing it all with the world? If the latter, why aren't they asking if anyone has copies that they can add to the current review? The fact is, it's unlikely they have copies for two reasons: first, for many years electronic files at the Department for Business were/are badly stored and/or lost, therefore in effect unrecoverable; second, for the past nine years or so a culture has developed in government and the civil service of not keeping notes and records. Why this is the case should be obvious by now.

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UPDATE NOW APPARENTLY MEANS 21 YEARS AND COUNTING . . .

8/26/2023

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Below is a photo of an extract from a paper circulated by the Department for Business to all stakeholders, prior to a meeting to discuss the future of the Furniture and Furnishings Fire Safety Regulations (1988).

It was sent in 2010 which was when the review formally began. However, for a few years prior to this there had been a lot of communication, meetings, emails, etc, between the Department and stakeholders, so this meeting did not come out of the blue for anyone. For example, the previous year I had contacted all key stakeholders asking them for their views on how a review could save money and improve fire safety. On the basis of their feed-back I wrote to our minister at the time asking him to approve a review, i.e. on the basis that stakeholders told us it would save around £35m a year; and he agreed.

So, here, the Department is announcing that this meeting will discuss the three options for the regulations: update now; leave unattended for the time being; revoke. And the Department states that the first is its favoured option and is also the one favoured by stakeholders. And indeed that was the view expressed and agreed to at this meeting.

So the decision was: update now. In 2010.

Move forward to 2023 and the Department has just gone out to consultation, asking for views on its preferred approach to the regulations: THIRTEEN YEARS AFTER IT WAS TOLD BY EVERYONE THAT THE REGS NEEDED UPDATING NOW. In the meantime, not a single aspect of the regulations has been updated.

And here's the key about this 2010 meeting: at the time, everyone believed the regulations worked. Nevertheless, as you can see, stakeholders were still concerned that the regulations were out of date, with products on the market for which no one knew if they were in or out of scope.

Even worse, stakeholders informed the government that if the regulations were not updated, there was a good chance they would become unenforceable. Which of course would mean they were useless. In 2014, Trading Standards informed the Department that because it had proven the regs are unfit for purpose, they would not be enforcing them any more. Two sets of reasons, therefore, that they are unenforceable; as indeed has been proven by the fact that for many years now Trading Standards has not brought a single enforcement (apart from basic mis-labelling) under these regulations.

There is of course no mention of any of this in the government's lastest consultation. Furthermore, as detailed in my previous blog post, the government is not telling anyone that the new regulations will be unactionable until they receive the accompanying Standards; and British Standards has informed everyone that Standards take five years to develop. Then you add another few years for consultation and embodiment (and a bit more for reasons I cannot reveal at the moment) and you're looking at another 8 years at least before anything changes.

Which means no change until 2031 at the earliest.

TWENTY-ONE YEARS since everyone agreed the regulations needed changing now!

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MEET THE NEW APPROACH, SAME AS THE OLD APPROACH

8/23/2023

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I'm paraphrasing here from the Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again". Except that I think Mr Townshend is savvy enough to know that we will very much get fooled again. Especially when the government and industry are working together to put profit before human health and the environment.

On 2nd August, the OPSS published:

Smarter Regulation: Fire safety of domestic upholstered furniture

The main document is headed:

Smarter Regulation: Consultation on the new approach to the fire safety of domestic upholstered furniture

There is of course a lot I could say about this "consultation" (which was somewhat slipped out with no fanfare and little to no warning) but for now, as a rough guide, there are two main things that you need to know.

1. On the day it was published, an industry friend phoned me. Before we'd said hello, we both broke into hearty laughter, as if we were auditioning for the part of a super villain; stopped briefly, then started up again. It was great therapy, so thank you for that, OPSS. Then my friend said, "Er, what exactly is this a consultation on?"

Well, no one appears to know, not even the OPSS. It says it's on a new approach to furniture fire safety. But this is patently not the case, a) because they had been dealing with this problem for many years previous to the Product Safety Review and Smarter Regulation approaches coming along; therefore, the implication that these were the inspiration for making changes to our defunct regulations is somewhat debatable, and b) who goes out to consultation on an "approach" to, er, a consultation anyway? Especially when there are two previous consultations on furniture fire safety – in 2014 and 2016 – which are still in effect outstanding.

2. The OPSS claims that new furniture fire safety regulations will be in place by 1 October 2024. This is highly unlikely if not impossible since feed-back from this consultation will definitely require at least another consultation. Also, the OPSS has without explanation included actual draft proposed regulations in this new release. In contrast to the main approach which is vague to the point of everyone being unclear what they are actually consulting on, these draft regulations are suspiciously specific, e.g. providing actual sizes for what constitutes a scatter cushion and what is a floor cushion (important difference since the latter requires all three fire tests), deciding that mattress covers now come under the furniture regulations when up to now they don't, deciding that outdoor furniture definitely comes into scope (when at present it's ambiguous) and much more. But the point is none of these decisions were made in conjunction with stakeholders, including industry. So, who did make them and on what basis? And of course they will require another consultation on their own.

Being charitable, you might think that all these specifics were included because the OPSS felt bad that after 13 years of reviewing the regulations (which don't work, just to remind everyone), the best they can come up with is a new "approach" to changing them, so have added lots of details to show they are "doing something". Being less charitable, the OPSS must surely know that stakeholders across the board are going to contest these specific changes and therefore there is no way new regulations will be ready to go in one year's time. There is no rationale provided for these proposed changes and being even less charitable, all indications are that the OPSS has no idea at all, for example, about the effect on industry, not to mention public health, that will result from including mattress covers in scope.

And – when they say:

"The new approach is based on safety outcomes, underpinned by a new set of voluntary standards developed by the UK national standards body, the British Standards Institution [sic: it's 'Institute']."
What they're not telling you is that these new standards won't be ready for at least another 8 years or so. In the meantime, the current requirements will remain in place. Which means fire safety regulations that do not work, accompanied by the highest levels of furniture flame retardants in the world, in every UK home.

Now, you may recall at this point that the Environmental Audit Committee concluded in 2019 that these regulations are not fit for purpose and recommended that:

"The Government should bring the UK into line with the rest of the EU and develop a new flammability test standard based on the EU’s smoulder test and California’s standard Technical Bulletin 117–2013. This should be delivered with a clear legislative timetable for the adoption of revised regulations. In the meantime, industry must acknowledge this practice is no longer sustainable and begin the process of innovating and adopting alternatives to chemical flame retardants."

In other words, the government should ditch the open flame/match test and fillings test and do what the rest of the world does and implement just a cigarette/smoulder test which will get rid of flame retardants overnight.

What does the new consultation say about the open flame/match test:

"Ensuring both flaming and non-flaming sources are considered is important because it cannot be assumed that if an article is resistant to one type it will automatically be resistant to another."
Who exactly considers a flame test to be important? Well, certainly the flame retardant industry does since they make a fortune from the masses of very toxic chemicals that go into our furniture cover fabrics. But no one is assuming that because fabric is resistant to cigarette ignition sources it will automatically be match resistant too. The fact is that the government itself proved in 2014 that the match test does not work. And never has. Therefore the question should be: do we need to introduce a match test that works? And here we go, because that's exactly what the government did in 2014! However, since then it's become clear that for many reasons that, as the EAC concluded, a match test is simply not needed.

Now, surely the OPSS consultation refers to the EAC's findings? Well, yes, sort of:

"In 2019, the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee published their report following an inquiry into Toxic Chemicals in Everyday Life. The report spoke of the ubiquity of toxic chemicals and called on the Government to enact a clear plan to address the impact of these chemicals on humans and the environment, and to ensure that the public has greater access to information about chemicals in products. It also specifically addressed the FFRs, calling for the removal from scope of baby products, because of the increased chemical exposure risk faced by young children, and replace the current flammability testing regime."

AND? Have you followed these recommendations, OPSS? Let me help you answer.

There is no "clear plan" to address the impact of flame retardants on humans and the environment or to ensure the public has greater access to information about chemicals in products. In fact, the OPSS commissioned "research" on this subject. They (or rather their agents) asked around 80 consumers what they thought about having more chemical information on furniture labels and because a few said they didn't understand chemicals, the OPSS concluded that there was no need to list FRs etc on furniture labels.

Baby products? Well, the new consultation proposes removing a few small baby products from scope but the EAC was very concerned – horrified in fact – that most children's mattresses contain high levels of toxic FRs and wanted all of them to be taken out of scope. The OPSS is now proposing to take out of scope just very small cot mattresses. Which means it wants children from cot-size age to 13 or so to continue being poisoned in their own beds. They are in essence dangling bait in front of the Baby Products Association hoping to get their approval and therefore "prove" that they are complying with the EAC's recommendations. How cynical is that? And why don't they fully do so anyway? Well, Sarah Smith of the OPSS told me that they didn't want to remove child mattresses before removing all mattresses from scope (presumably since it would be the thin end of the wedge), and these proposals include adult mattresses.

What about the fact that the EAC concluded that the regulations are not fit for purpose?

Well, the OPSS's consultation has an answer to that too:

"The Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988 have reduced deaths by fire and are recognised and recommended internationally as a gold standard for furniture fire safety to this day."
This is what passes for science from government departments these days, i.e. opinion expressed as fact. There is no evidence at all that the UK regs have reduced fire deaths. Indeed, the UK is only sixth in the furniture fire deaths league, the first five places being taken by countries that do not have any flammability requirements for their furniture. They are not recognised by anyone (other than the flame retardant industry and it's puppet organisations like the European Fire Safety Alliance) internationally as the "gold standard for fire safety to this day". Note, no references or examples are given. But I could give plenty of international examples of those who do not believe our regulations even work, e.g. US firefighters, the Green Science Policy Institute of California, IKEA, the European Furniture Industries Confederation, not to mention just about every UK green lobby group and cancer prevention societies.

To summarise: for 35 years the UK has kept in place furniture fire safety regulations that have never worked. The government knows this through its own research (still available on its website), through confirmation by a government select committee and numerous green and safety groups; plus confirmation by the fact that no one, not even the chemical industry, has been able to dispute this (other than through telling lies). And that the rest of the world is content with fire tests that are significantly less stringent than ours with no lessening of fire safety and which also do not lead to large volumes of toxic flame retardants in their furniture.

Yet now the government has gone out to consultation on a new version of the same old problem: three fire tests which do not work and will lead only to the continuing poisoning of the entire country. And that's after they finally (if ever) actually change anything (see above: getting new standards in place to make the new regs effective is several years away at least).

Why are they doing this? Well, the hubris of civil servants plays a large part; that and the general state in which we now live, with government putting industry profits first, public health and the environment a distant second (examples everywhere, from our sewage poisoned rivers to the disgraceful treatment of Grenfell survivors).

Sorry . . . I can feel maniacal laughter building in my chest again, so we'll leave it here for the time being.

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HOW TO IGNORE THE MANY UPHOLSTERED ELEPHANTS IN THE ROOM

UPDATE NOW APPARENTLY MEANS 21 YEARS AND COUNTING . . .

MEET THE NEW APPROACH, SAME AS THE OLD APPROACH

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