The house dust project 2002 - 2003
Regardless of where we work, where we live, how we travel or how we spend our leisure time, we all come into contact with toxic chemicals on a daily basis. This problem has been of increasing concern to many people in recent years and now, it seems, the European Commission has responded to this rising concern by proposing a new system of chemicals regulation in Europe called REACH.
This newly proposed legislation has the potential to be the most far-reaching reform of chemical regulation for many years. We need to campaign to make sure the final proposals are strong and not watered down by the chemicals industry, who are already lobbying hard to see them weakened.
This means that there has never been a more important time to campaign on the issue of toxic chemicals and to alert public opinion to the presence of toxic chemicals in their daily lives. It is critical that the government is made aware that this is an issue that many, many people care deeply about.
Anita Roddick The Greenpeace toxics team temporarily gave up inflatable boats and instead took up vacuum cleaners to get our message on toxics out to the government!
We hoovered 100 homes around the UK - including the homes of Anita Roddick, Malcolm Bruce MP and Robin Harper MSP - to collect dust which we are now analysing for the presence of chemicals. A similar project was run by Greenpeace in the Netherlands and it was enormously successful at highlighting the ways in which toxic chemicals can end up in unexpected and unintended places.
Robin Harper, MSP The dust samples were sent off to a laboratory for analysis to look for chemicals. We found a range of toxic chemicals in domestic housedust, the results of which are published in a report called Consuming Chemicals. The report is being used to underline to the UK government that it is essential that the legislation suggested in REACH is taken up so that chemicals in everyday products are regulated properly and effectively.
