Archived press release

Euro-Election Candidates Challenged on Chemicals

13 May 2004

People around the country, and across Europe, are being urged to target candidates standing in June's European Elections to ask them to pledge to support tougher chemical legislation, via a new multi-lingual web site, hosted by Friends of the Earth. Chemical regulation is currently being debated in Europe, with widespread concerns about the impacts of chemicals on the health of developing children. The new MEPs will play a vital role in putting the new laws in place.

The website [1], launched today (Thursday 13^th May) by the European Environmental Bureau, Friends of the Earth Europe and Greenpeace, at www.chemicalreaction.org, allows members of the public to email candidates in 13 member countries, including the UK. Further countries and languages will be added soon.

The European Union is currently debating the REACH (Regulation, Evaluation and Authorisation of Chemicals) legislation, Europe's biggest reform of chemical legislation. Environmentalists hope it will end the global contamination of humans, animals and the environment by hazardous chemicals. But interference from the chemicals industry has weakened the proposal put forward by the European Commission. The new Parliament will have the chance to put human health and environmental considerations back at the centre of the reform.

Chemicals are implicated in a number of health problems, including respiratory, bladder and other cancers, mesothelioma, skin disorders, respiratory diseases, eye disorders and asthma [2]. A significant number of chemicals in every day use remain in the environment and build up in human tissue. Babies in the womb are exposed to a number of chemicals and there are concerns that some interfere with the development of infants.

Friends of the Earth Safer Chemicals Campaigner Mary Taylor said:

`We need strong legislation on chemicals to protect the health of future generations. But unprecedented lobbying by the chemicals industry threatens to destroy this new law. This website provides a way for MEPs to hear the message from ordinary people - the people they represent. The public expects to be protected against the risks posed by these chemicals and MEPs should be fighting on their behalf."

Environmental groups across the 25 European Union countries are asking MEP candidates to sign a pledge, committing them to vote for:

• the identification and mandatory substitution of all chemicals of `very high concern'

• the public's right to know, on request, what dangerous chemicals are present in consumer
  products and for hazard labelling when chemicals of `very high concern' are present

• chemicals in imported products to be subject to the same rules as for those for chemicals in EU-made products.

Notes

[1] The website www.chemicalreaction.org currently offers candidate lists and emails for Belgium, the Czech Republic, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Hungary, Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Finland and the UK, all available in the native languages. Further countries and languages are to be added soon.

[2] DEFRA (2004). UK Consultation paper on the New EU Chemicals Strategy - REACH

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