The Wall Street Journal-20080216-Senate Forges Consumer-Safety Bill
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Senate Forges Consumer-Safety Bill
Full Text (482 words)Following a rash of toy recalls last year, Senate Democratic and Republican leaders announced Friday that they reached a compromise on a bill to overhaul the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
The Senate is likely to vote this month on the bill, which would give the agency greater resources to remove unsafe products from the marketplace, but it would still have to be reconciled with a bill the House passed in December. Although industry groups have raised objections, the agreement appears to put CPSC-overhaul legislation back on track to clear Congress, especially in an election year when a crackdown on unsafe children's products has broad consumer appeal.
The bill would boost fines for safety violations to $20 million from the current $1.8 million, restore the commission to five members from three and require the safety agency to set up a database containing reports of injuries, illnesses or deaths from consumer products submitted by the public.
The bill also would extend the temporary two-person quorum for nine months so that the CPSC can continue to conduct official business, such as mandatory recalls and moving ahead with new regulations. The commission has been without a third member since its former chairman resigned in mid-2006, and rulemaking stalled again when a temporary, two-person quorum authorized by Congress expired Feb. 3.
The Senate agreement was announced by Sen. Mark Pryor (D., Ark.), chairman of the Commerce Committee's consumer-affairs panel, Commerce Chairman Daniel Inouye (D., Hawaii) and the committee's ranking Republican, Ted Stevens of Alaska. Sens. Pryor and Stevens said they believe the agreement will lead to bipartisan passage of the bill in the next few weeks.
Industry groups have favored the House bill, and Friday's compromise brings the Senate bill more in line with several provisions of the House legislation, including lower civil fines. The Senate bill originally had proposed a maximum fine of $100 million.
The Senate bill would ban lead in all children's products, let state attorneys general file lawsuits to stop sales of dangerous products and require third-party safety certification of children's products. But the CPSC would have the authority to approve testing by proprietary labs under certain conditions. Consumer groups had wanted only independent, third-party laboratories.
The bill also would increase funding levels for seven years starting at $88.5 million in 2009 and growing 10% per year through 2015. An additional $40 million would be authorized to upgrade the agency's laboratories. The Senate bill also calls for an additional $1 million to research the safety of nanotechnology in products.
Manufacturers still oppose provisions in the Senate bill. "We believe that the Senate provisions dealing with attorney general enforcement, whistleblower and information disclosure, among others, would not improve product safety or strengthen the CPSC, but instead promote litigation and lead to much more delay in taking action to address unsafe products and protecting the public," said National Association of Manufacturers Vice President Rosario Palmieri.
