In my last post I began to examine the extent to which, in the event of Britain leaving the EU, and in the absence of an agreement on the mutual recognition of conformity assessment procedures, there would be technical barriers to trade in industrial goods. I outlined the Old and the New Approach to EU Product Safety legislation, and showed that under the New Approach with CE Marking, British manufacturers could continue much as before. In the worst case, it is possible that they might have to change the Notified testing laboratory they employed to one belonging to a company established in the European Union, but I argued that even this could well be made unnecessary in most cases by means of subsidiaries of British testing and certification companies, or through subcontracting.
In this post I want to begin to examine the situation that would pertain in the Old Approach sectors, which include foodstuffs, biocides, motor vehicles, chemicals, cosmetics, detergents and pharmaceutical products. Whereas, in the New Approach, a whole sector may be covered by a single Directive or Regulation setting out the broad safety objectives, and a multiplicity of harmonised standards set by the European Standard organisations (CEN, CENELEC and ETSI), in the Old Approach the detailed requirements are contained in the EU legislation itself. Today I look at chemicals, of which UK exports amounted to £24.7bn in the 12 months to November 2014, and of which exports to EU countries increased by £0.7bn in 3 months between January and April 2016.