Being Welsh, I would not intervene on an issue on which the Scots felt strongly.
Under the Bill, goods are satisfactory if they,
“meet the standard that a reasonable person would consider satisfactory, taking account of”,
how they have been described, their price, and all other relevant circumstances. Those “relevant circumstances” are specifically stated to include any public statement about the “specific characteristics of the goods”. That suggests to me and many others that any description is of the physical characteristics of the goods, rather than any claims made about the use of the goods—that is, what they will do. Therefore, for example, merely to describe a washing machine by size, colour, capacity, speed, energy efficiency et cetera, is probably rather less significant to a busy parent than whether it will get the football kit clean, or whatever it is that they want to use the washing machine for. That is probably not what the machine has been sold as doing; it has been sold as being a certain size, and having so many revolutions per minute.
Our amendment aims to broaden the definition to include public statements about the outcome that goods are claimed to achieve. In the Commons, the then Minister said that the term “specific characteristics” would capture outcome claims, such as whether a washing-up liquid that claims to remove grease actually does so. She also said that advertising standards rules and consumer protection regulations provide additional protection. However, particularly as regards the ASA rules, I am not convinced that that would cover in-shop leaflets or posters. We therefore remain concerned that if those words are not in the Bill, it will not be clear to the retailer, and certainly not to the buyer, whether such claims about what the product is meant to do will be honoured.
If the Minister believes that such claims are covered, it is hard to see why that should not be included in the Bill, given that the objective is to have everything in one place and made clear. We would like to be sure that such claims are covered, and the best way would be to include them in the Bill. I beg to move.