The “Right to Repair” features in the party manifestos of both the Green Party and the Liberal Democrats ahead of the UK general elections! (N.b. we reached out to the party leadership in both cases.)
We tried to influence Labour but it was obviously not as simple. Labour Party and Scottish National Party also mention issues directly related to product standards without using “right to repair”. (Reminding that Labour has the highest number of MP endorsements to the Manchester Declaration.)
Unfortunately, nothing positive to report on resources, product standards or Right to Repair in the manifesto of the Conservative Party. Here are all details:
Green Party:
You can find it at page 19-20 of the manifesto
Require manufacturers to offer ten-year warranties on white goods, to encourage repair and reuse. We will create a comprehensive ‘right to repair’, to require manufacturers to keep goods operational years after purchase and to ban the practice of producing goods with the intention that they will become obsolete in a few years’ time
Require manufacturers to only produce the most energy efficient white goods, TVs, lighting and electric cookers
Boost the repair and recondition sector with new apprenticeship schemes.
Lib Dems:
Reference to Right to repair can be found in the section of the manifesto on Green Industry, Green Jobs and Green Products:
Benefitting consumers through better product design for repairability, reuse and recycling, including extending the forthcoming EU ‘right to repair’ legislation for consumer goods, so helping small repair businesses and community groups combat ‘planned obsolescence’.
Introducing legally binding targets for reducing the consumption of key natural resources and other incentives for businesses to improve resource efficiency.
Labour:
The manifesto mentions the importance of reducing embodied carbon on page 16:
Over the past three decades, Britain has reduced its emissions at the expense of domestic industry by offshoring production. This is an accounting trick, not a solution. It does not protect the climate, is unfair to other countries and it damages jobs and communities at home.
Labour will take full responsibility for our carbon footprint instead of passing the buck. We will instruct the Committee on Climate Change to assess the emissions the UK imports as well as those it produces, and recommend policies to tackle them, including making UK industry the greenest in the world.
SNP:
Key points are on page 29 of the manifesto:
[SNP MPs will]
• campaign for the UK to remain aligned with EU environmental regulations even if Brexit takes place
• demand the UK accelerates its action to meet Scotland’s climate change targets – the toughest legal targets in the world - of a 75% reduction in emissions by 2030, net zero carbon emissions no later than 2040 and net zero of all emissions by 2045
says they will promote full alignment with EU standards.