Following the recall of millions of toys worldwide, there have been understandable concerns about the safety of our children's playthings, particularly those that come from China. On Wednesday 26th September the British Toy & Hobby Association will allay the fears of parents and highlight the stringent safety procedures that surround the manufacture and sale of toys in the UK.

But what measures can parents take to make sure their children’s toys are safe? By simply ensuring that the age warnings and guidelines on the packaging are followed and by looking out for the Lion and CE marks, parents can protect their young ones from untested and potentially unsafe toys.

Old toys should also be checked. Any broken or damaged toys should be thrown away rather than given away, which may pass the potential accident on. Parents are being urged to check for loose fur, ripped seams, sharp or rough edges, loose eyes and noses or any broken parts that could cause choking or other accidents.

Join David Hawtin, BTHA and Jerry Burnie, Toy Safety Officer at IQS live on Thursday 27th September.

H: Jayne Constantinis, host
D: David Hawtin, BTHA
J: Jerry Burnie, Toy Safety Officer, IQS

H: Hello and welcome to the Consumer Advice Show. I’m Jayne Constantinis and in today’s show we’re going to be asking how safe are our children’s toys? Now there have been lots of stories in the media recently about toys having to be recalled because of safety fears. So how confident can we be that the toys that we’re buying for our children aren’t going to harm them. Now whether you’re buying for your own children or for somebody else’s we hope that by the end of this chat you’ll feel a whole lot more confident about how to buy well, and wisely. And in fact to help give parents confidence, the British Toy and Hobby Association has recently held a summit to discuss all things to do with toy safety and how they can strengthen it. And I’m joined in the studio today by David Hawtin from the British Toy and Hobby Association Jerry Burnie whose the BTHA Toy Safety adviser. Thanks very much, welcome. Thanks for coming in to talk to us.

J: Thank you

D: Hello

H: Tell me first of all about the summit and what it hoped to achieve?

D: The summit was stimulated in the wake of the recent recalls of products from China for design defects and also for quality control problems, and the conclusions of the summit was we need to strengthen the safety systems in two ways, one is we’ve got to get over a message to the Chinese manufacturers to improve their quality control as the products are manufactured, that’s right the way from design stage to delivery, and secondly we want to strengthen the European enforcement system which is strong in countries like Germany, France, Britain and the Netherlands, but it’s actually rather weak, very weak in some cases amongst the other 27 member states. These weaknesses are bad for our consumers in terms of counterfeit or dodgy toys coming into the UK market and secondly they’re bad news for those manufacturers who take the trouble to comply with very strict European regulations

H: Ok. So that’s what the summit was about, let me just interrupt you for a second and say of course we’re live, and you can ask your questions of David and Jerry, just write it in the box, the bottom of the screen, press send and we’ll get through as many as we can during the course of the chat. Is this, the importance of toy safety a new phenomenon - what’s the history of it?

D: The history is there’s always been a concern about the safety of children, I mean and do us it’s paramount, the safety of toys is absolutely paramount. We’ve had European standards starting from the 1970s, before that you had a French standard, German, Dutch, British and frankly the market was a mess. But with the Toy Safety Directive coming into force in 1991 we actually have common rules, common standards, across the whole market of 450 million people in the EU. So it’s an amazing achievement, we’ve got one standard, one approach

H: And as an advisor Jerry what’s your involvement?

J: Well I’ve been involved in approving toys, in assessing toys and appraising them in terms of their fitness for designs for certain customers, but for our members with the BTHA I support them with information on changes in legislation and improvements, and also we produce guidance with our members that spreads best practice throughout our membership to ensure people are producing toys to the correct level. And I think it’s something to build on, what David said earlier, it’s strengthening that, it’s not creating it from scratch now because it’s an issue, it’s strengthening what is there and reviewing what we are doing to ensure that that continues to give a high level of safety for toys

H: Well we’ve actually got a short clip of child - of toy safety testing in action. Let’s just have a little look at that and see what you guys get up to

Video footage

H: Now I’m assuming they weren’t torturing those toys just for the fun of it. What areas do you test for?

J: There’s a whole raft of areas, there’s more than 27 tests and different legislation that’s applied to toys from various industry sectors, so it covers quite a wide area, from flammability which you saw on the screen on one particular toy through to just the general physical parameters, whether the seam’s break, whether they have sharp edges. Through to the toxic elements and the chemicals involved with the toys. And there’s a whole separate section for electrical toys or any particular risks that can be identified

H: And for toys that are aimed at different age groups as well, I mean I’ve got a three year old so we’re just out of the soft – well we’re not out of of course, no we’ve got thousands of soft toys, but that’s where we are, whereas in 10 years time we’ll be looking at quite different – and it’s the small components for that age group that are particularly difficult isn’t it?

J: That’s one of the main factors yes to keep small components from children who are likely, or more likely, which is the younger age group, to actually put them into their mouth and swallow them

D: It’s true, the burden of standardization demands use and abuse test is on toys intended for children under 36 months, and if you look at the Toy Safety Standard, particularly part one for mechanical physical hazards, that’s where most, the most important safety tests and safety standards are applied. Simply because children that age normally don’t use a toy properly

H: Yes. And they’re quite unpredictable and you don’t know what stage they’re reaching. Let’s take our first question, because in fact it’s about soft toys so you may have covered it already. Andrea Dealy wants to know ‘what are the most important things a parent should look for when choosing a soft toy for their children?’

J: Well one of the classic symptoms or classic things that can go wrong is small components being pulled off a soft toy

H: Like an eye or a nose

J: An eye or a nose, yes and there are stringent tests for those where they are pulled to a very high strength. But you can do an assessment yourself to see the attachments of the eyes. You can look at the seams, you can feel the toy overall to see if there are any sharp edges or sharp finishes or anything inside that might be heavy or sharp for the toys, so it’s a physical assessment really for a soft toy

H: Yes. Of course the difficulty as a parent is what other people buy your children isn’t it? So the same rules apply when you’re buying for other people’s children, obviously

D: Yes. Could I make a comment on that point? One of the concerns we share with a number of children’s organizations is what I’ve dubbed the Einstein factor, which is granny in particular who thinks that her grandson or granddaughter is an absolute genius and at the age of two can cope with a toy aged for 4, 5 or 6 year old. This is absolutely the wrong thing to do

H: We’ve had that, yes

D: You don’t advance your child’s intelligence like that. Two problems you’ll risk, apart from the safety one is that if the toy is too complicated the young child’s not going to like it or have any benefit

H: And may in fact get frustrated and may have the opposite effect

D: And you have this major safety issue with small parts or whatever, so don’t upgrade the toy according to what you think the child can cope with. This means when there’s a warning on the toy which says ‘not suitable for children under 36 months’ it absolutely means that

H: Yes. Good point. So talking of marks and labels and so on, let’s imagine we’re in a toy shop and we’re looking to buy something for our child or somebody else’s. Give us some guidance on what we can look out for in terms of labeling and marks and so on to be absolutely confident that this toy has been properly tested

D: Ok well we have a box here, and on one side is a very critical mark, the CE Mark, which is a league of requirement under European law, to declare that the toy complies with the European Toy Safety requirements. There’s also the BTHA Lion Mark which is our own code of conduct, which actually covers safety, advertising, marketing, even working conditions in Chinese toy factories –

H: Wow

D: Is covered by that. And we even have a Toy marking requirement to cover that which is quite topical at the moment. Then on this side you have the address, the essential address of the manufacturer. Now this is not really of terrible importance in my opinion for the consumer, because really if they’ve got a problem with a toy they should take it back to the retailer

H: Right, ok

D: This is one for traceability purposes so that the trading standard officers

H: Yes

D: Who enforce it know –

H: Know, yes –

D: Where to go to follow up a complaint. And if all else fails and you’re not sure what to do, go to your local trading standards officer anyway if you’re unhappy

H: Now that’s a full house of marks and labels and so on. Which is the most important? What if I’m looking at a toy that has only one or two of those?

D: What in the sense of compliance?

H: Yes

D: I would – well – see – I would say the CE Mark is the critical one in the sense of that is a legal declaration

H: Yes

D: So the toy, in all the circumstances, should comply with the law

H: Yes

D: I think that’s the key one

H: Yes, ok

J: What I would say Jayne as well is there are a lot of warnings on packaging and people get fatigued with warnings and sometimes skim over them and don’t pay attention, and they are there for a reason and if the manufacturers are concerned enough to put a warning on then I would urge parents to read through them and make sure they understand them, I think it’s easy to quickly skim through and not understand them

H: I think yes and do you know I think – dare I say – health and safety has a bit of a bad reputation at the moment, I think a lot of people look at it and think they’re covering themselves, it doesn’t really apply, yes my child is 6 months older, younger than that, I think it’s going to be fine. I think you’re right, people do have rather a blasé approach to it, but we obviously shouldn’t. How important is it for parents, you know anybody buying a toy to even bother to think about where it was made, if you’ve got these critical marks on the box?

D: Well the economic fact is that for about the last 20 / 25 years, the bulk of toy manufacturers moved to China, initially to southern China where there’s originally about 3000 toy manufacturers, it’s estimated there’s 10,000 factories employing about 3 million people, we’re not talking about a back street industry, we’re talking about one that can supply very demanding markets such as the USA and the European markets, which require top quality toys and safe toys, so in fact it’s quite difficult in a European context to go into a toy shop and find many toys that are made outside of China

H: Yes

D: I mean, there are Indonesia and Japan for example, but the vast number, 80% at least are Chinese

H: Because there’s a danger isn’t there that we all have a – just now – a complete sort of downer of anything made in China, but that’s not the case. And what about buying from reputable retailers, how important is that?

D: Well that’s critical. There’s branded toys and there’s of course brands so called in the high street. Retailers who desperately don’t want to lose their reputation, least of all with supplying children with dangerous toys or non-compliant toys, so our first advice is go to a store that you know, you feel comfortable with, could be a specialist retailer, it could be one of the high street big names, they can’t afford to take the risk of supplying non-complying toys. And we’ve discussed the labels and all that, and it’s important, because if you buy a toy in a car boot toy for example they’ll be no packaging, they’ll be no warnings, they’ll be no labeling, no instructions for use, could even be unhygienic, so that’s not a good way to treat your children in my view

H: Yes

D: If you’re not sure about what toy to buy for a toy, the reputable store can help you with advice

H: Yes

D: Which toy do you recommend for my child?

H: For that age group

D: So you get that satisfaction and assurity of buying a proper toy

H: Now we’ve got a question in from David who wants to know ‘isn’t there a worldwide unified toy safety standard? If not why can’t the BTHA lobby for this or get the government to?’ Jerry perhaps you’d like to start with that?

J: A simple answer is no

H: What there isn’t?

J: There isn’t a worldwide, there are different standards in different territories

H: Right so we follow one that’s European based?

J: We follow European standard as anyone within the EU –

H: And there’s another one in the States and –

J: Yes they have an ASTM standard, there are standards in Australia, there are different ones throughout the world, so toys are made for many markets in terms of lobbying, I don’t know whether David you want to –

H: Would it be a good thing to have a worldwide standard?

D: It would, and in fact there is, under the International Standards Organization an attempt at a World Toy Safety Standard, but getting agreement between say one block and another, I think the World Trade Organization, the Americans have a view on certain areas and the Europeans have quite different views on toy safety, so the ISO standard which is an attempt at a world standard has taken all the points of agreement, but left out all the ones they can’t agree on, so to that extent it’s good, and some countries like Saudi Arabia I believe have adopted the ISO standard, but the fact of the matter is, and I think there’s some cause for concern in the US about this, the EU is leading on world regulation in nearly every field

H: Ok

D: Including toy safety

H: Well that’s very pertinent in fact to a question we’ve got in from Wendy from Norwich who wants to know if she goes on holiday within the EU can she be certain of buying safe products for her kids? So the answer presumably is yes, very much so

J: Yes and she can look in the same way for the same markings, the CE Mark you’ll be able to see even if it’s in a different language you’ll be able to see the CE Mark on packaging, so that would be common depending on where she’s buying, so –

H: Because that actually, traveling and maybe buying local products, that’s another area of potential danger isn’t it, because you don’t know what the paints are, you don’t know how it’s been put together –

D: Yes and there is an issue here. I can imagine going to some countries in, when you’re on holiday, and you’re buying something which is perhaps a toy, or looks like a toy, but it might come better under the heading of an ethnic product

H: Yes I know exactly what you mean, yes

D: That kind of hand crafted product

H: Yes

D: Made beautifully by a local craftsman, but I’m not sure that I would necessarily think that the paint is of adequate quality, so going back to what we said earlier about buying toys in the UK, once again you really need to go to the crème, to the high street store or somebody with a reputation, rather than risking perhaps – and I’m talking really about the toddler – older children don’t tend to put things in their mouth, but I’m not so sure about what appear to be craft products, which may not actually even in European terms be regarded as toys or playthings

H: Yes. And talking about age again, and you’ve touched on this briefly but let’s revisit it, Susan from Wales wants to know ‘don’t you tend to over estimate the age range to be on the safe side?’ and this of course is coming back to my just sort of feeling that I have of oh they’re being over-cautious in the packaging. Is that true?

D: I – Jerry may have a view on this I’m sure but there’s possibly a slight confusion between age suitability in terms of toy safety, that’s 0-3, 3-6, and above 10 for chemistry sets, and those manufacturers who attempt an age grading based on the development of the child

J: Or the play value

D: The play value

J: Of the type of toy

D: But you’ll find that that’s a separate marking, it really can’t be confused with the age grading, which is the critical safety aspect

H: Because sometimes on the packaging it will say suitable for… so is that a generic terms that covers safety and suitability for age of development?

J: The area you need to look at is where it’s not suitable for, they’re the legal breaks, so if it’s not suitable for under 3 years, that’s what you’re worried about. Where it says recommended for or suitable for and it’s sort of 5, 6s, 8s, they’re not under the regulations, that’s sort of the manufacturers or designer’s guide as to who would benefit from it the most

H: Right ok

J: But the actual legal breaks you’ll see warnings and you’ll see it’s not suitable for

H: Ok, and we should be following those?

J: Yes, yes

H: We haven’t got much time left, but if you do want to ask a question then just type it in the box and click go. David Dean has done that from Bristol, ah now he’s find out that some of the toys he bought for his children have been recalled. What’s the procedure, what should he do?

J: Well any of the manufacturers have websites, we have a link from our own website to the main manufacturers involved. He should go on there as a first step and investigate whether his toys are actually the right ones and what to do, and they should give full information depending on the individual manufacturers so –

H: Ok, and obviously you get a complete refund and blah blah blah and that’s all –

D: Yes and in the meantime take the toy away from the child

H: Yes

D: Don’t sit there worrying because your email hasn’t got through

H: Quite

D: You can’t get through on the telephone hotline

H: Yes

D: Just take it away from the child till you know whether it’s subject to recall

H: If it’s safe or not, yes. Bill’s sent in a very useful question for him, ‘what should I buy my child for Christmas?’ Thanks for that Bill, we don’t know how old your child is, what they’ve already got or what they like. But something that’s for the correct age range

J: Definitely, that would be a good start point, yes

H: Look for the labels on the box.

D: Could I mention there too, and I don’t want to sound at all cynical or adult about this, but children come back in our experience from school holidays knowing what they want for Christmas, so to avoid disappointment, but you reduce the lack of surprise element, it’s probably a good idea to try and find out what they want, because that’s what the playground or the group will probably decide is cool

H: Yes, quite. What’s wrong with a conker and a piece of orange in their stocking?

J: There’s probably a lot of safety issues

H: A few bits of wood

J: With the conkers

H: Well listen unfortunately we’ve run out of time, thank you very much for coming in

J: Thank you

H: I think you’ve given us some really useful advice and I think probably alleviated a lot of concerns that parents have. That is all we’ve got time for, thank you for watching, if you want to know more about Toy safety then why don’t you go to the BTHA website, they’ve got a parents page, and it’s btha.co.uk/parents_page and there’s a lot more information there about toy safety, thanks for watching, see you again very soon. Bye bye

Still got a question or comment?

Name

Your question Question

Enter code