Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The provisions on misleading commercial practices in the Consumer Protection Act 2007 give effect to the provisions of Directive 2005/29/EC on Unfair Business-to-Consumer Commercial Practices. With the exception of commercial practices in the area of financial services, the Directive is a maximum harmonization measure whose provisions cannot be exceeded or supplemented in the national laws of Member States. It is not open to me consequently to review the Act for the purpose proposed by the Deputy. One of the main concerns about online blogs relates to the fact that bloggers may not always disclose that they are being paid to promote products. A misleading practice of this kind is covered by Section 55(1)(x) of the Act which provides that it is a prohibited commercial practice for a trader to make a representation or create an impression that the trader -

(i) is not acting for purposes relating to the trader's trade, business or profession when the trader is so acting, or

(ii) is acting as a consumer when the trader is not.

The European Commission have recently published a proposal for a Directive to amend Directive 2005/29/EC and other consumer protection Directives. While the proposed amendments do not directly address the issue of misleading information on online blogs, the discussions on the proposal may provide an opportunity to raise possible concerns about this issue.