Aim to prevent illegal practices and reduce consumer damage by strengthening procedural mechanisms to protect the collective interests of consumers
The Plenary of the Parliament unanimously approved a harmonizing law that allows lawsuits by consumers to protect their collective interests.
The aim is to prevent illegal practices and reduce consumer damage by strengthening the procedural mechanisms to protect the collective interests of consumers, in order to provide the possibility of issuing prohibitory orders, as well as remedial and/or remedial measures.
In his statement, DISY MP and President of the Parliamentary Trade Committee Kyriakos Hatzigiannis, referred to attempts by the competent Ministry to remove rights that consumer representatives had. In effect, it said it was taking away their ability to sue collectively, which was not accepted and the Commission restored the rights of collective action. At the same time, he expressed concern about the great confrontation between the Ministry of Commerce and its political superior with consumer associations. He said that this rift and this polemic “must relax” in order for everyone to focus on the goal of fighting punctuality.
AKEL MP Kostas Kostas criticized the incredible, as he described, delay from the executive power to bring the relevant harmonization bill, which while it had to be approved by December 2022 reached the Parliament in April 2023, bringing once again, as he said, the Republic of Cyprus one step before the court and the fine.
DIKO MP Chrysis Pantelidis rejected as arbitrary the opinion of Mr. Chatzigiannis regarding the war policy of the Minister. Trade versus consumers. He said that the Government, on the contrary, took pro-consumer initiatives such as enhancing competition with e-kalathi. Woe betide him, he said, if whenever there is a dispute the Ministry is seen as fighting consumers. He mentioned that he could claim something similar in the case of Mr. Hatzigiannis who disagrees with e-kalathi. He also mentioned that when the Anastasiades Government brought the e-kalathi, Mr. Hatzigiannis welcomed the initiative, while now he disagrees. that he supported an e-kalathi with two axes as is the case in Greece. He also said that only Mr Pantelidis agrees with this unilateral content of the proposal. they were so pressed with the matter of accuracy that they realized that the tools they had could not use them. He added that they should apologize to the world because they delayed implementing the obvious.
The President of DIKO Nikolas Papadopoulos noted that with the law being passed for the first time there will be mass lawsuits by consumers for unsuitable products. It is, as he said, an important innovation, a tool in the consumer's quiver that could possibly increase the safety of products.
