Boots branch fined over waste regulations breach

A branch of high street pharmacy Boots was fined over €1,000 and became the first company prosecuted for breaching a European Union directive aimed at cutting levels of electrical waste, it emerged today.

The firm pleaded guilty at Wexford District Court to two breaches of the Waste Electric and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) regulations.

Boots Retail (Ireland) Ltd was fined €1,200 and costs of €6,865 were awarded to the Environmental Protection Agency which brought the charges.

The court found Boots’ Wexford branch failed to maintain a specified notice in-store telling customers that prices included the cost of a Producer Recycling Fund to ensure that WEEE is collected and recycled.

And it ruled Boots failed to include in an advertisement offering electrical and electronic equipment the contribution to be made to the fund on top of the net price. The ad was printed in the Irish Times on October 27, 2005.

Dr Gerry Byrne, Programme Manager, EPA said: “The WEEE Regulations are consumer-friendly and environment-friendly and in failing to comply with the regulations companies put compliant retailers at a competitive disadvantage.”

The EPA’s Waste Prevention Unit enforces the WEEE Regulations which hope to prevent the generation of electrical and electronic waste and to promote reuse, recycling and other forms of recovery.

The EPA and the Office of the Director Consumer Affairs are working closely in regard to the correct pricing of WEEE at shops nationwide with inspectors from ODCA actively looking at the issue.