Safety Investigators Need Your Help

A fight is brewing. The outcome will determine the safety of every family in America, your own, your children, your parents, your neighbors, your family. It will also determine the size of Big Business corporate profits for perhaps the next decade. And that's the reason it's a fight.

If we were just talking about the amount of lead allowed in toys, there'd be a quick answer from scientists. If it was just a question of whether or not manufacturers ought to obey the law, there'd be no real debate. If the issue was just the safety of a child's bicycle, no one would dare raise their voice. Of course, those are the issues. And the issues are a lot more than that too.

The federal safety agency that is in charge of monitoring the safety of thousands of consumer products is under attack, again. Consumer advocates are trying to get Congress to pass a law that gives the Consumer Product Safety Commission more money to operate and some protection from being sued when it issues a safety regulation or makes a recall order or does any one of the hundreds of other things that it does every day, attempting to help protect American families from harm.

As one of the CSPC Commissioners said, the agency is at a crossroads and either Congress will so cripple it that they might as well close it down or Congress will reverse the agency's steady decline into oblivion.

Since virtually every other federal agency has that protection, you wouldn't think it would be tough to put that protection in place for the one agency that is critically important for the day to day health and safety of every American, but it has been. Big Business corporations have been able to keep the threat of litigation hanging over the heads of federal safety investigators in order to keep them from aggressively regulating their industries and impacting their profits with those pesky, bothersome safety regulations.

Regulations like the one that made 3 wheeled Atv's illegal to sell in the US because they were so easy to roll over and crush the kids that ride them. That one got passed pretty much because the public outcry was so loud that even the industry couldn't ignore it anymore.

The US Senate has 2 bills in front of it, S.2045 and HR. 4040. One is good for consumers and the CPSC, and the other is bad. There are 4 key, and damning, differences.

S. 2045 contains a section that will reverse many of the law's provisions that actually protect Big Business, including some that actually protect companies that break the law or make and sell dangerous products.

More importantly, S. 2045 gives state law enforcement officials the ability to act on behalf of the federal safety agency, something that is also in HR. 4040. States can even use the law to sue for damages to their constituents. With a federal agency that is underfunded and understaffed, it makes sense to give state government the right to help enforce safety laws intended to protect the public.

Especially important, the proposed law also gives the CPSC protection from lawsuits that Big Business might file against safety investigators in response to fines or legislative decisions. That's something that almost every other regulatory agency has and needs so that they can make honest decisions without fear of being tied up in court by Big Business efforts to stop the agency's enforcement of safety standards.

If Big Business wins this fight, you lose. It's that simple.

S. 2045 will give consumers the most protection. It's that simple, too.

And don't believe the false and inaccurate propaganda dressed as press releases that Big Business outlets (like "Open Market.org") is spreading. Research it and read it yourself and you'll see the truth. S. 2045 is not about "trial lawyers" --- it's about protecting people from things like unsafe toys from China and thousands of other cheap and dangerous products that are being sold in the US with little regulation and enforcement. S. 2045 is about protecting you and your family.

If you want to make sure your children are safe, that your family isn't exposed to dangerous products and imported faulty products, then now is the time to do something about it.

Click here to write or call your US Senator and ask them to VOTE FOR S. 2045.

Meantime, if you are the victim of an unsafe product, a dangerous vehicle, a lemon motorhome or other lemon vehicle, then email us or call us Toll Free at 1-888-331-6422.

Fighting to protect consumers is what we do. It's what we've done since 1978. Some of our staff have owned lemon cars too so we know what it's like to get ripped off by defective products. We also know what it's like to get even. It's why we do what we do here.