EU: Proposed revision of the EU General Safety Regulation

 

The proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on general product safety aims at revising Directive 2001/95/EC on general product safety. The proposal confirms the key requirement that consumer products placed or made available on the EU market must be safe.

According to the proposal a consumer product can benefit from the presumption of safety if it complies with the relevant European standard referenced in the Official Journal of the European Unionor, in the absence of such European standards, it conforms to the relevant national requirements.

The proposal includes a set of clear obligations for economic operators (manufacturers, importers, distributors, fulfilment service providers), including the drawing up of technical documentation by manufacturers and traceability in the supply chain. The proposal also provides for specific obligations for online marketplaces relevant for product safety (including clear deadlines for reactions to government takedown orders and third party notices and ensuring that traders provide minimum product and traceability information in their listings).

Moreover, the proposal enhances market surveillance by largely aligning the market surveillance rules for non-harmonised products to the market surveillance rules set up for harmonised products in Regulation (EU) 2019/1020.

The new draft will be a regulation, and not a directive, as until now.  This means that it will apply directly in all the EU member states and will not have to be transposed into the national legislation.