中国发布缺陷汽车召回草案

The Legislative Affairs Office of the State Council has published a draft regulation on recalling defective vehicles and is now soliciting public opinions. According to the regulation, car manufacturers must cease producing, selling or importing defective vehicles and recall them if problems are identified.

Xing Wei is the senior associate editor from China Automotive Review, a company that provides automobile information and consultation service. He says the regulation marks another step in making China's auto market more mature.

"China has become the world's largest car market since 2009. The total car sales reached 18 million last year and we predict the number will probably go over 20 million this year. As there are more people driving on the road, the recall system is going to play an important role in protecting public security and consumer rights."

Xing Wei says since China implemented its first vehicle recall system in 2004, more problems have been found with vehicle quality. He mentions last year's KUMHO tire quality scandal in China, where thousands of cars equipped with faulty tires were recalled by car manufacturers. And it has revealed a blank area of the law about whether the car or the tire manufacturer should be responsible of a car recall in such cases. Xing Wei says he's content to see the problem settled in the regulation.

"The new regulation says if defects are found in tires equipped on an end-product out of factory, it's the car manufacturer's responsibility to recall them. And tire manufacturers are responsible for those in original packages. I'm happy to see this gap in the law filled up."

Xing Wei also applauds another act in the regulation which enforces a 1 million yuan maximum fine on car manufacturers that refuse car quality inspections by national quality supervisory departments when possible defects are reported. However, lawyer Zhang Weiyun, member of the Beijing Lawyers Association, thinks the penalty has been set too low.

"It's way too low. The fine should be in proportion to recall cost. For instance, if a car factory were about to recall 200 thousand cars, the cost of recalling each car is 1000 yuan, it should spend 200 million yuan altogether. I think the factory would rather take the fine than recall those cars. The cap should be set higher and a formula should be introduced to calculate the fine."

Zhang Weiyun says Japan has almost as many cars running on the road as China. Japan's upper fines reach 2 billion yen, about 16 million yuan, 16 times higher than our cap. Zhang adds that many factories only admit problems and carry out recalls when they are investigated by supervisory departments, and the department can enforce high fines. If the fine is set too low, the supervisors lose their power too.

However, that's not the only flaw Zhang Weiyun found.

"The ninth act in the regulation says any unit or individual can file complaints to the national quality inspection department about possible defects. This act apparently facilitates people safeguarding their consumer rights, but the time limit for the quality inspection department to respond is not regulated. Thus, nonfeasance of quality inspection departments will not be effectively prevented."

The Legislative Affairs Office is open to public opinion about the regulation until March 4th. You can log on to www.chinalaw.gov.cn to download the draft and express your opinion.

For CRI, I'm Wang Wei.