Senate Toughens Toy Regulations

The Senate Thursday overwhelmingly approved an overhaul of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, including tougher regulations for children’s toys.   

After nearly a week of debate, the Senate voted 79-13 to increase funding for the agency to $156 million by 2015, create a public consumer database to log faulty products and ban lead from children’s toys.  

The database will store consumer complaints as well as tracking information on product recalls.

The bill also allows manufacturers to be sued for up to $20 million for defective products and prevents companies from retaliating against internal whistleblowers.

Lawmakers began focusing on toy safety after a host of overseas manufacturing recalls last year. 

- Erika Lovley