Consumer Law

CPSC: Working to Foment Fear At the Expense of Kids

By Joe Consumer

We?ve written about toy safety and specifically, the importance of the landmark Consumer Product Safety Act (CPSIA) in making sure kids stay protected.  Incredibly, toys with illegal lead levels continue to be sold in discount stores, showing all the more how urgent it is that this law is enforced.

Unfortunately, the Consumer Products Safety Commission is STILL dragging its feet with respect to providing guidance to smaller enterprises (like home businesses and libraries) as to how the law applies to them?and the longer that goes on, the more apparent it becomes that the agency?s inaction is part of a deliberate attempt to sabotage the law.

Consider this recent news item about the effect of the CPSIA on children?s books.  According to the article, ?The Consumer Product Safety Commission has interpreted the law to include books but has neither concluded that older books could be hazardous to children nor made any recommendations to libraries about quarantining such tomes.?

Now, as we?ve said and the agency has every reason to know, the CPSC?s silence on this issue has the effect of causing widespread confusion, and providing big corporate opponents with a rather potent PR weapon against the entire law.

The law basically directs the CPSC to exempt children?s goods that pose no risk of harm, telling the CPSC to issue exemptions to the law ?taking into account normal and reasonable foreseeable use and abuse of such product by a child.?  But the agency won?t act on these exemptions?and we can only conclude after all this time that the corporate shills within the CPSC (like former Director of Consumer Affairs for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and current CPSC head, Nancy Nord, who has always loathed this law) are intentionally trying to kill the CPSIA?at the expense of kids.

Full post as published by ThePopTort on March 18, 2009 (boomark / email).