Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they plan to restrict the use of formaldehyde in domestic articles such as MDF panels that are found to emit formaldehyde fumes that exceed World Health Organization safety limits.

Under the Construction Products Regulation, MDF manufactured in Europe must be labelled to European standards ‘E1’ or ‘E2’. 95% of EU companies comply voluntarily with the ‘E1’ standard, meeting World Health Organisation (WHO) guidelines.

Proposals for a restriction to control formaldehyde releases from articles (which would include wood-based panels) are being considered under the EU Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) regime. The European Chemicals Agency is expected to produce its opinion on the proposal around 20 March 2020, though the subsequent adoption of a legislative decision will be dependent on the outcome of further discussions.

In a no deal exit from the EU, all existing EU restrictions will continue in the UK. A UK REACH system would retain the process for restricting a chemical.