Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that electrical goods offered for sale by third party sellers on online marketplaces are safe for use in the UK.

The Government is committed to ensuring that only safe electrical goods can be sold in the UK. All distributors have a duty to act with due care to ensure products they are selling are safe, this includes online retailers selling goods via marketplaces.

The Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS) is engaging proactively with major online marketplaces to ensure that they are playing their part in protecting UK consumers from unsafe products. The OPSS has recently taken action to ensure that a number of non-compliant products being sold by overseas third-party sellers have been removed from sale, including electrical appliances.

The OPSS is also developing a new voluntary commitment for online marketplaces to agree actions they will take to reduce the risks from unsafe products being sold online. This will enable online marketplaces to demonstrate their commitment to the safety of their consumers in the UK by publicly promising to work with UK regulators.

In order to ensure that the UK’s Product Safety framework is flexible and fit for the future, the OPSS is conducting a review. This will ensure we have a framework that delivers safety for consumers while supporting businesses to innovate and grow and will consider the impact on product safety (including electrical goods) of new business models such as third-party sales through online marketplaces.