Currently, furniture and furnishings fire safe regulations are more stringent in the UK than elsewhere in Europe. The British Furniture Confederation met with Ed Davey to ensure that this will remain the case, and to pledge the UK furniture industry’s support of the existing flammability regulations and their ongoing review by the department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS). The delegation was keen that any revision would not weaken the current regulations, which the BFC believes would be detrimental to UK consumer safety, and affect the competitiveness of the UK upholstery and beds sector.

Commenting, Stephen McPartland, MP said, “Safety within the furniture, beds and furnishings industry is of the utmost importance. Although there are no planned changes to the Fire Safety regulations currently held in the UK, we want to ensure that we continue to produce the safest furniture products possible in the UK.”

The BFC and BIS felt the meeting was necessary in order to ensure that the flammability review was not cancelled, as part of the government’s campaign to de-regulate and cut red tape. However, the BFC also took the opportunity to propose to the Minister that dropping the bunk bed regulations would be an acceptable to the industry

The delegation from BFC included Martin Jourdan – chair of the BFC, Richard Plowman of the Leisure and Outdoor Furniture Association, Jessica Alexander from the NBF and FIRA’s principal technical manager, Phil Reynolds,

The meeting concluded positively, with the minister acknowledging that the Regulations should not be relaxed in anyway, and recognition of the furniture Industry’s support of the regulations. The BFC subsequently re-iterated its position in a letter sent to the Minister.

In addition the BFC also urged the minister, who is in the process of reviewing the current set up on consumer protection not to allow Codes of Practice currently managed by the OFT to be left in limbo – and in particular those still in the process of approval such as the furniture code submitted by The Furniture Ombudsman. The Minister agreed this was not acceptable and undertook to look into it a matter of urgency.