Compared with other standards, BS 7671 is pretty cheap. That may be because it is sold in much greater quantities than yer average Standard, or perhaps the aim is to encourage compliance.

Previous editions can be found on eBay pretty cheaply.

I'd like to see British Standards much more freely available. At one time Hampshire CC libraries subscribed, but not for many years.

Laws must be freely available and clear so that people can see what they have to do to comply. I think that the same could be said of BS EN ISO standards. However, there is a difference between a manufacturer buying a copy of say, BS 1363 to ensure that their plugs comply on the one hand, and a consumer who wishes to check that the plugs that he has bought do indeed comply on the other hand.

So should the BSI be nationalised and funded by the tax-payer?

A topic indeed worthy of a Friday debate, or any other day for that matter!

From my own business perspective, access to standards is often important but not critical. We specialise in relatively small projects in the hospitality industry, extension to a pub or hotel, conversion of a building to a restaurant or off-licence, that sort of thing.

My primary function is to ensure that the project is compliant across all aspects of building Regulations. On our plan submissions to Building Control, we must state that, for instance, the emergency lighting shall comply with BS5266-1 2016, even though it has been set out on the plan in full adherence of same. Not doing so for this or the fire alarm, fire safety notices, spread of flame, extinguisher systems, lift provisions, electrical installation, floor coverings…..you name it, would result in a rejection notice being issued. 
Now who is in receipt of all this high-brow material? Often a small local builder and his band of subbies none of whom would want to wade through any type of technical standards. They just need to be told what to do. That is the function of the plan and its attendant specification. 
So whilst I must quote the relevant standard on these documents, I do my very best to be cognisant of the person reading them on site rather than of the BC officer, who already has good technical grounding.

So in my world, which is generally around the bottom of the barrel, I doubt that free access to standards would have any major advantage. Good clear guidance is, however, a blessing for me, especially the range of free issue approved documents that address the Building Regulations!

Hi Mike

See URL below.  Might be worth a read.

eurogip.fr/.../

Hi Andy

See URL below.  Might be worth a read.

eurogip.fr/.../

Hi Graham

See URL below.  Might be worth a read.

eurogip.fr/.../

Sergio Fernandez said:

Hi Graham

See URL below.  Might be worth a read.

eurogip.fr/.../

UK is not in the EU (but does use harmonized standards for products in the same way).

As an example from above, though, BS 7430 is not mandated in legislation so if the UK accepted the view (and there's no indication one way or another that it will do so), the installation standards in general wouldn't necessarily come under this banner.

BS 7671, however, is referred to directly in the ESQCR and ESQCR(NI) ...

Very interesting development. probably with more impact than the folk who have done it yet realise.

And I would agree that you should not have secret laws, so the standards you require to read to meet the requirements of current legislation, which may be more than those named by doc number in the statutory instrument or whatever, should indeed be accessible - which may not mean free to take away.

I also appreciate that it knocks a hole in the bottom of the bucket for folk whose living depends on selling copies, so I do not expect resolution to be swift.
We may also end up with an odd situation where the international standard is open, but the national one derived from it is expensive.

Mike.

gkenyon said:

so if the UK accepted the view (and there's no indication one way or another that it will do so)

With every major UK party promising tax cuts and consequent cutbacks in public services in their manifestos it would seem unlikely that they'll be keen to do this...

Very interesting ruling, particularly regarding harmonised standards for CE marking (which at present are effectively the same standards as for UKCA marking).

Seems like a bit of an administrative nightmare as there will be some standards which must be free and other, quite similar ones, which need not be, just depending whether they have been identified as harmonised or not. Also, how far down the tree does this go - taking EMC for example, the harmonised standards call up sub-standards which define the test process, which in turn sometimes call up sub-sub-standards...I can see the legal wrangling will have only just started as to how many of these are legally mandated and therefore should be free.

I fully agree with Mike:

mapj1 said:

probably with more impact than the folk who have done it yet realise

Any of us who've been involved in standards production and maintenance know how expensive (time consuming) it is. Not to say that this is a right or wrong decision, but the consequences of how many standards it will actually affect, and how those standards then get paid for, is interesting.

On a side topic, taking the statement in that link "Relying in particular on the principles of the rule of law and of free access to the law" so does this mean that access to legal advice (solicitors / barristers) should also be free? And indeed technical expert witnesses? Again there is a perfectly sound argument that it should be - and that it actually has a rather bigger impact on the ability of the "person in the street" to bring legal action, or defend themselves against legal action, than the cost of standards has. (e.g. see the argument presented in books by "The Secret Barrister"). If, say, a member of my family was harmed by a not-to-standard piece of engineering then it wouldn't be the cost of the standard that would put me off suing the manufacturer, it would be the far higher cost of the legal team. But I guess the counter argument is that at least this change would be a marginal gain.

You may also get an odd reversal of the current situation where organizations don't want their standard enshrined in law, so it can be kept closed.
It's not quite the same as the legal costs case, as you can represent yourself, but it is most unwise and unlikely to succeed.
However in you hypothetical case, the manufacturer would also be keen to avoid such costs ,and at least saying 'look - you failed to take account of the fact this standard requires an interlock on electric blade sharpeners' or whatever, may push them to fix the problem, and settle out of court rather than with a legal team. I fear a great many cases just benefit, well, the legal team...

Standards, free or otherwise are not protection against really scary dangerous things - like this 'laser pecker' knock-off on off Ali-express,  you import yourself, as it is shipped from overseas, and most folk doing so have no idea of the legal implications.

 But no warning about eyes or risks of reflected beams firing it at a shiny surface. Blinding kit in a box.  Hurt someone, and legal responsibility lies with the importer, who introduced it into the UK and as it is delivered to your door from the far East at your request, all compliance is bypassed and, well the buck stops with you..

(I pick this example as someone at Scouts has just bought one, or one very like it, and with its laser power of a few watts it burns lovely black text and graphics into wood, leather, table tops, and also lovely red welts into hands (!) etc. As laser safety chap at work, seeing these class 4 lasers open beam and in unskilled hands is toe curling frightening. We worry once we pass the 1 milliwatt level.)
Mike.

As with many things that can be purchased on the internet it is a case of Caveat Emptor (Latin for Buyer beware) UK legislation needs to change to include online sellers like Amazon, Temu and ali express (I am sure there are many others) that to sell into the UK market the items MUST be safe and MUST comply to UK/BSI standards in the same way that an item in Tesco or Argos high street store does.  (Other high Street stores are available)

mapj1 said:

like this 'laser pecker' knock-off

I'm simultaneously thinking "ouch" and "I want one..."

But then I have a belt driven lathe with open belts in my workshop, meanwhile simultaneously in the day job raising observations on clients because they haven't got adequate message alerts on the alarm systems on the cut-out switches on the covers on their equipment...

mapj1 said:

Stadnards, free or otherwise are not protection against really scary dangerous things

There's a course I wrote on functional safety with a slide on EMC, where I point out that compliance with the EMC standards proves you have...compliance to the EMC standards. (And, when I deliver it myself, add in that I am on the standards panel for the relevant standards for our industry, I know exactly how the limits came to be set where they were.) They do not prove that anything will actually work correctly or safely in the real world, which rarely meets the standard. So absolutely, they only get you so far.

As an ISA I really do draw on 40 years of experience to determine whether I agree that a supplier has done all that is reasonably practicable to consider the safety of their system before it's placed on the market, compliance to standards is a red line that must be met, but there's plenty more that usually needs to be considered. And in very many product liability cases those are the important issues, which need the same level of expertise to argue that not enough was done.

That said, there also plenty of cases in consumer products where the standards red line hasn't been met (particularly where it comes to UKCA marking), but that's a criminal law matter so not for the individual consumer to pursue anyway (except to raise it with trading standards as a potential breach)...but that's back to the discussion further up the thread.

mapj1 said:

like this 'laser pecker' knock-off

I'm simultaneously thinking "ouch" and "I want one..."

But then I have a belt driven lathe with open belts in my workshop, meanwhile simultaneously in the day job raising observations on clients because they haven't got adequate message alerts on the alarm systems on the cut-out switches on the covers on their equipment...

mapj1 said:

Stadnards, free or otherwise are not protection against really scary dangerous things

There's a course I wrote on functional safety with a slide on EMC, where I point out that compliance with the EMC standards proves you have...compliance to the EMC standards. (And, when I deliver it myself, add in that I am on the standards panel for the relevant standards for our industry, I know exactly how the limits came to be set where they were.) They do not prove that anything will actually work correctly or safely in the real world, which rarely meets the standard. So absolutely, they only get you so far.

As an ISA I really do draw on 40 years of experience to determine whether I agree that a supplier has done all that is reasonably practicable to consider the safety of their system before it's placed on the market, compliance to standards is a red line that must be met, but there's plenty more that usually needs to be considered. And in very many product liability cases those are the important issues, which need the same level of expertise to argue that not enough was done.

That said, there also plenty of cases in consumer products where the standards red line hasn't been met (particularly where it comes to UKCA marking), but that's a criminal law matter so not for the individual consumer to pursue anyway (except to raise it with trading standards as a potential breach)...but that's back to the discussion further up the thread.