No guarantee on gas regulators

The consumer watchdog cannot guarantee the safety of gas regulators on the market, saying its remit is to ensure they comply with international standards.

A spokesman for the Malta Competition and Consumer Affairs Authority said it was not in a position to guarantee the products’ safety.

“The MCCAA can declare if a par­ticular product is compliant with the applicable regulations or otherwise,” the spokesman said.

The consumers’ watchdog was asked about the safety of gas regulators still on the market when in August it had decided to withdraw only two of the regulators available to Maltese consumers even though it later admitted that all five that were tested had failed specialised testing in Finland.

The withdrawn regulators were the green ones, manufactured by Italian supplier Lagoplast and the blue TPA Butane regulators.

The watchdog had explained that, after all five failed the lab tests, it conducted a risk assessment and withdrew from the market those which, according to the results, posed a serious risk to consumers.

The problem with all the tested gas regulators was with the dimensions. The assessment involved categorising the dimensional non-compliances reported on each regulator tested, those that had direct impact on possible leakages and those that did not.

On the basis of this assessment, two regulators were recalled and the others, which were considered as having no direct relation with possible leakages, “were discussed with the manufacturers/importers and were remedied accordingly”.

No explanation was given on the remedy.

Asked about gas cylinder valves, which also failed the Finnish lab tests, the MCCA spokesman said the dimensional non-compliance of the valves tested did not have a direct impact on possible leakages.