Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what his policy is on restricting the sale of second-hand electrical goods; and what assessment he has made of the effect of such policies on the number of electrical accidents.

My Department does not have a policy on restricting the sale of second-hand electrical goods. There are two pieces of legislation relevant to second hand electrical goods; the Electrical Equipment (Safety) Regulations 1994, and the General Product Safety Regulations 2005. They require that equipment must only be supplied which is safe.

On 5th March we laid before Parliament a Report on the Application of The Consumer Protection Act 1987 for the period 1 April 2008 – 31 March 2013 which includes some statistics on enforcement action taken by Local Authority Trading Standards Services for electrical products in 2011-2012. However, these are not broken down to show accidents involving second-hand products.