Previous attempt by the European Commission to introduce higher safety requirements for upholstered furniture in Europe

• In 1990 the EC issued a mandate to CEN to produce standards for testing the fire resistance of upholstered furniture. This was partially completed, with the result that European standards EN1021 Pt 1&2, setting out the procedure to assess the fire resistance of upholstered furniture to cigarette and match ignition, have been adopted as voluntary standards by every Member State.
• A draft Directive was prepared by the Commission in 1990.
  The first essential requirement of the draft directive was ignition resistance; this was the reason CEN was mandated to produce EN 1021 1& 2 above.
  The second essential requirement was aimed at controlling the behaviour of furniture after ignition has taken place.
• The Commissions justification for the second essential requirement was “ Control of the level of ignition resistance is necessary, but is not sufficient in itself to ensure the safety of persons”
• But the Commission withdrew the Directive in late 1991 stating that more technical and scientific work needed to be done on post ignition fire behaviour. Commissioner Bangemann commented ” This is a matter of the highest importance and urgency both to eliminate obstacles to trade and to protect public health and safety. I am urging acceleration of that research.”
• In 1992 the Secretary General of the UEA (European Furniture Manufacturers Federation) Bart de Turck stated “ The UK legislation has shown itself not to be a frontier and the furniture industry considers that there is no further reason for a Directive under Article 100A.” and proposed a voluntary standard of cigarette resistance only, the EUFAC scheme.
• In 1995 the CBUF study initiated by the European Commission, at a cost of 2.5 million Euros, reported:
• That fire statistics show that the majority of European casualties are due to fires in upholstered furniture.
• That cigarette resistance was met by all tested samples, even those sourced on markets where there was no requirement for this standard. (indicating that the principle hazard which upholstered furniture needs to be protected against is the flaming ignition source e.g. match or lighter.)
• That there are ways of improving the fire performance by material selection and the design of furniture.
• BEUC issued a press release welcoming the findings of the Commission funded research programme and called for urgent action to protect consumers by Europe-wide legislation on furniture flammability.
• In July 1995 Commissioner Bangemann responded to BEUC proposing a labelling system for furniture passing the relevant flammability tests: EN1021 parts 1 &2, and EN597 Parts 1&2. and a post ignition behaviour test following the results of the CBUF study.
• In 2001 DG SANCO stated that they wanted to give a mandate on upholstered furniture under the then new approach of the revised GPSD in order to set standards with the stronger status foreseen there. They wanted a complete set of standards covering both resistance to fire (performance standards and the testing methods without which performance standards would be meaningless) and post ignition fire behaviour.
• DG SANCO saw the way to proceed with a mandate as more a technical than political issue and that it should be dealt with by the Directorate-General in question.