User:
pedro
Date: 10/31/2007 8:05 pm
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S. 2045 (Pryor), a bill to reform the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) passed out of the U.S. Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee yesterday. The bill will give the CPSC the tools it needs to effectively protect consumers from dangerous products.
25 million toys were recalled in 2007. This number alone should make it clear that the CPSC is not adequately manned or funded to handle the job of keeping dangerous products off of store shelves. The federal government spends twice as much money monitoring animal feed and drugs as they spend monitoring practically every consumer product on the market.
S. 2045 increases the CPSC’s annual budget from $62.7 million to $141.7 million by 2015, and significantly increases the agency’s authority to get unsafe toys off of store shelves quickly. The bill increases civil monetary penalties from $1.8 million to $100 million, requires independent third party testing of products, and contains a bright line ban on lead paint in children’s toys.
The next step for the bill is the Senate floor.
