Imagine you run an EU based cosmetics SME, one of the 9000 in Europe. Your company makes products that consumers love. They are buying more of them. You are happy that products fall under EU cosmetics legislation, the strictest in the world for safety. Consumers in the EU and beyond trust your products. You are considering taking on new employees.
One day, your company learns that the EU is aiming to simplify existing regulation to make it easier for companies to compete - the Chemicals Omnibus. This might help address the hurdles you have been facing recently.
For example, your products contain an ingredient which has been used safely for many years in cosmetics. But you have recently heard that the EU would like to ban it. You wonder why the EU is banning an ingredient which is safe for use in cosmetics? The reason is that under the EU’s CLP rules, substances can be classified as hazardous even if they don’t pose a risk to consumers when their actual use in products is taken into account.
Classification does not mean a ban per se – for example it may lead to labelling requirements for some sectors. But because safety in cosmetics is paramount, we don’t take chances. Ingredients classified as CMR are automatically banned in cosmetics, unless a derogation is granted.
This is a story that reflects the reality of the challenge to our industry from the impact of hazard classifications which are not based on cosmetics use
You agree that we need to be extra careful with such ingredients. You are confident about the safety of your product, so you enquire about the derogation. You know that the EU has a safety assessment body, the Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS), which takes a strict approach to ensuring ingredients are safe for use in cosmetics.
But some parts of the derogation rules leave you puzzled. The CLP classification was based on ingestion. But obviously cosmetics are put on the hair or skin, not eaten, and accidental ingestion is considered in the safety assessment mandatory under EU rules.
Then you learn that there is an alternative ingredient, so you should use that. But the ‘alternative’ doesn’t work as well, is expensive and difficult to use. You worry that your global competitors will have better products with the original ingredient, but for you as an EU company it’s banned.
You think a derogation is justified. You ask for some guidance from a chemicals expert. ‘I am terribly sorry’ she says, ‘this needed to have been started before the classification became official. With all the criteria needed to be assessed, you have run out of time’.
You wonder if you will be expanding and need extra employees after all.
The industry takes no chances with safety. But we don’t think safe ingredients should be banned
This is a story that reflects the reality of the challenge to our industry from the impact of hazard classifications which are not based on cosmetics use. It is a challenge the Chemicals Omnibus attempts to address.
The industry takes no chances with safety. But we don’t think safe ingredients should be banned. That is not how to support competitiveness. The Omnibus proposal streamlines and clarifies some features of the derogation such as the food criterion, uncertainty about alternatives, irrelevant hazard scenarios, and unfeasible timelines which do not contribute to consumer safety at all.
But crucially, the essential aspect of the derogation system, the role of the SCCS in ensuring the safety of ingredients, is maintained.
The Commission’s Omnibus proposal makes it less likely that safe ingredients will be banned. But 100% certain that ingredients that need to be banned, are banned.
We ask the Parliament to support both safety in cosmetics and a more competitive industry.
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