Lack of regulation in vitamin industry

New “opt out” procedures for anti-competitive actions could pave the way to class actions against the lucrative but little regulated UK vitamin and nutrients supplement industry.

Lack of regulation in the £400m industry has left UK consumers exposed to fraudulent labelling and misleading health claims, according to Leigh, Day & Co associate Sarah Moore.

She says some companies promote their health supplements “in flagrant breach of labelling and advertising rules, with little risk of significant penalty or large scale consumer litigation”.

The US courts are hearing an increasing number of class actions based on misrepresentation in marketing and labelling, however, UK lawyers have been slow off the mark. Moore says the reason may be the lack of an “opt out” mechanism to enable lawyers to bring cost effective group actions for low value individual claims. 

Writing in this week’s NLJ, Moore says Sch 7 of the new Consumer Rights Bill, which will introduce an “opt out” mechanism for anti-competitive group actions in the UK, could offer a remedy.