ChemRegs Newsletter – January 2025
UK Government to consult on harmonising GB CLP with EU CLP
The UK Government is considering harmonising its chemicals, labelling and packaging regime, known as GB CLP, with the EU CLP Regulation.
This follows in the wake of the failure by the Northern Ireland Assembly to apply the so called ‘Stormont Brake’ to the introduction of the latest changes to EU CLP that will also apply in Northern Ireland.
Northern Ireland continues to follow EU laws, which the rest of the UK does not, due to the Brexit deal put in place to prevent a hard border with Ireland. The Stormont Brake mechanism was introduced under the Windsor Framework agreement in 2023 and gives the Northern Ireland assembly the power to object to changes to EU law that apply in Northern Ireland, post-Brexit, as long as certain conditions are met.
Members of the Northern Ireland legislative assembly (MLAs) had applied to invoke the Stormont Brake in regard to the anticipated impact of the EU’s updated CLP Regulation in Northern Ireland in December 2024. This change was cited by the Northern Ireland Assembly as one that could have a significant impact on Northern Ireland’s businesses.
The EU update to the CLP regulations, which was published in the Official Journal of the European Union in November 2024, includes the introduction of new hazard criteria for properties such as endocrine disruption, persistence, bioaccumulation, toxicity, and persistent, mobile, and toxic characteristics. The update also sets out new rules on packaging and labelling chemicals, for example on the fonts and spacing on the labels.
However, the Northern Ireland secretary, Hilary Benn, wrote to the speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly and told him that the UK Government had concluded that the conditions to apply the Stormont Brake have not been met in this case. Mr Benn also said that he felt that the CLP update “does not create new hazard classes, but rather extends hazard communication requirements, including through labelling, in respect of those hazard classes which exist and already apply in Northern Ireland by virtue of different provisions which were introduced in Northern Ireland in December 2022, although of course, it will require classification of substances according to those classes.”
Mr Benn also disagreed that the EU update would have a significant impact on the UK’s internal market, as “there is already existing divergence between the applicable labelling regimes in Northern Ireland and Great Britain, as an area of devolved competence, with separate labelling requirements already binding on chemicals placed on the Northern Ireland market”. It was also felt the transition times afforded to Northern Ireland to adapt to EU CLP would give businesses time to adapt.
Mr Benn went on to say that the Government “recognise that there is no room for complacency in terms of potential impacts” and “recognise the important issues that were raised in the notification concerning the protection of the UK internal market.”
Further, that “the Government will take any future steps necessary to avoid new barriers arising from the classification, labelling and packaging regimes in place in Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, resulting from the Amending Regulation, that would affect supplies into Northern Ireland. To this end we will consult on how best to safeguard the UK internal market, including on whether to apply a consistent regime across the UK.”
It is understood that the Government intends to launch this consultation “as soon as possible” and industry stakeholders, members of the public, as well as MLAs and the NI assemblies’ “relevant committees” will be able to respond. The Government will write to the Chair of the Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee to advise of the opening of that consultation.
Mr Benn said “This approach will ensure that our domestic regime does not undermine the smooth operation of the UK internal market and Northern Ireland’s integral place within it in all circumstances.”
There have also been a number of indications from the new UK government that they will seek to align with the EU on chemicals regulations in order to promote growth. The UK Government committed to developing a new Chemicals Strategy to set out its approach for managing chemicals. However, the publication of this strategy has been subject to a series of delays.
UFIs
New material is available online for managing UFIs in poison centre notifications.
The ECHA Poison Centres webpage has a new infographic that is aiming to help companies ensure that the Unique Formula Identifiers (UFIs) included in their poison centre notifications are correct.
The UFI serves as a link between a specific hazardous mixture and its corresponding information submitted to poison centres. Poison centres rely on the UFI to quickly and accurately identify hazardous products and advise in emergencies.
The obligation to generate and notify UFIs is with companies who need to place the UFI on the label of their product. At the moment this only applies to mixtures placed on the EU market as the UK has not adopted this obligation as yet.
ADR 2025
The online version of the 2025 edition of ADR has been published on the UNECE website. It is available for free download in English from the following links:
Volume 1 English https://unece.org/sites/default/files/2025-01/2412006_E_ECE_TRANS_352_Vol.I_WEB_0.pdf
Volume 2 English https://unece.org/sites/default/files/2025-01/2412010_E_ECE_TRANS_352_Vol.II_WEB.pdf
Also available is the latest corrigendum:
Corrigendum 1 https://unece.org/sites/default/files/2024-10/ECE-TRANS-352c1E.pdf
As explained in our December Newsletter, ADR 2025 is applicable from 1 January 2025 but there is a six-month transition period whereby the previous version, ADR 2023, may continue to be used until 30 June 2025.
For more information on anything in this Newsletter, please contact us at info@chemregs.co.uk