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EUROPEAN REVIEW

ISSUE 32 - Page 5

Massive chemicals directive REACHes for parliamentary approval

The reform of EU legislation on chemicals which goes by the name of Registration, Evaluation and Authorisation of CHemicals or REACH, is going through the European Parliament. With its huge scope and importance, the proposal's 1200 pages are being fought over line by line in committee. We examine whose interest is prevailing in this battle and what sort of law is likely to emerge.

A MEASURE TO CONTROL THE IMPORT, production and use of 30,000 substances discovered before 1981 might be expected to take a long time before it appears on the statute books. The REACH proposal, having been consulted on and had a trial conducted on it, has now come to the next stage of its winding road to implementation.

Over 2 years ago (see issue 25) the European Review reported on 'an internet consultation' to be held by EU Commissioners who then published a revised text. Earlier this year the SPORT (Strategic Partnership on REACH testing) project examined the effects of the new law on about 50 substances involving 54 companies and 9 Member States. Now the proposal has entered the parliamentary process where it has recently been considered by three separate committees. There has been intense lobbying by industry to water down some provisions of the new law. The SPORT results, which the ETUC believes showed that the plans were perfectly workable, 'identified workability concerns' according to CEFIC (European Chemical Industry Council) who demanded changes. Guido Sacconi, rapporteur for the European Parliament on REACH, expressed his

'resentment and disappointment' at the failure of CEFIC to engage with his plans to help small businesses implement the proposal.The Industry and Internal Market Committees have now considered 2,200 amendments to REACH and have adopted 900 of them. Industry interests such as CEFIC have been pleased with the direction of the changes as they undermine the original intention to test all pre-1981 substances produced in quantities of more than one tonne annually. Now the limit will be raised to 10 or even 100 tonnes and the companies may be called on to identify the riskiest chemicals which need to be tested. Green MEPs were furious, with Satu Hassi of Finland accusing the majority of following 'the line of the "cancer lobby"' while Caroline Lucas from the UK warned that legislators must not become 'puppets of the chemical giants'.

The lead committee, Environment, has still to vote on its report on the proposal and the full European Parliament will not debate it until October or November. Once their decision is known the Council of Ministers must come to a consensus under the 'co-decision' procedure (The EU Presidency, currently held by the UK has already published a compromise proposal which includes the 10-tonne limit). So there are plenty of opportunities for trade unions, consumer and environmental groups to reverse the thrust of the changes. The total cost of not doing so is estimated at 4,500 lives a year while the cost to industry of REACH as it stood would be 0.04% of its annual turnover.

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