I guess that my email sparked off some dialogue in Europe, what came back
from the SMART group was an email from Peter Swanson of SMART Group in
answer to a member question raised by the mailing..
The Ice is cracking, just need the IPC to take a similar view on "what it
can do for its members" maybe get Dieter to step in and call Peter?? And I
believe the leverage needed would be complete no?
The dialogue below is in response to a question from a SMART member asking:
==========================================================================
What I can't understand is why somebody like the Smart Group did not point
all this out to the EU before we had to put up with this expensive nonsense.
Dave
++++++++++++++++++++
David Hudson
==========================================================================
Email response from Peter Swanson:
I suppose some background might be helpful.
The SMART Group did have some involvement at the consultation stage of the
legislation, and made comments about the suitability of it at that time. I
do not remember the exact details, but if I recall correctly, Mike Judd was
involved. More information can be arranged.
When it was seen to be inevitable that the RoHS legislation would go
through, the SMART Group's Steering Committee agreed that:
A) we would not take any political stance on the lead-free issue, and so
would not lobby for or against it
and
B) we would press ahead full on with helping our membership and the industry
at large with coping with it
The rationale was as follows: we know how much effort it takes to be a
lobbyist to the EU. The experience of similar associations to ours told us
that it is pretty much a full time job, using experience, skills and
resource which we just do not have. We would need to raise our membership
fees considerably (probably by a factor of 10) to be able to afford it. This
sort of activity is not within our remit.
There are organisations which are far better positioned to accomplish this,
with closer links to government and industry movers and shakers, like
Intellect, IPC, etc. This is their job. We would have been foolish to take
on this job ourselves, and possibly negligent to spend our members' money on
something which is beyond our abilities.
I guess we all have reservations about the legislation, some more than
others.
Nevertheless, on realising that the legislation was inevitable, and taking a
pragmatic view, we decided that our job was to assist our members and the
industry at large in tackling the technical issues involved in meeting RoHS.
This we have achieved, and will continue to do so, with, I must say, huge
success. Our seminars and events on the subject have been both numerous and
heavily attended, and have been chock full of the meaty issues - some of
which have concerned non-technical issues (logistics, legal, etc). Being a
part of the LEADOUT project has given us access to some funding to help us
with these activities, and we think we have fulfilled our end of the deal
and then some. I am very proud of my colleagues who have orchestrated these
initiatives, and who have provided our membership and the industry with
considerable benefits.
SMART Groups members have found this legislation both expensive and
frustrating.
The committees are totally open to suggestions from the members as to how we
can do more for them, both with this issue and others. Please let us know.
Regards,
Peter
--
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Peter Swanson Oxfordshire, England
Honorary Life Vice President
The SMART Group http://www.smartgroup.org
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
-----Original Message-----
From: SMART Group smart-e-link
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of David Hudson
Sent: 12 June 2006 11:55
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SMART] European press on lead in solders
On 12/06/06, John Burke <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Apologies I inadvertently sent this out under an old thread, I have
> re-named it for the forum.
>
> I sent some data to the trade press in Europe. Seems they have been
> doing their own digging.
>
> Here is the UK daily Telegraph piece on the RoHS lead in solders ban.
>
> Is this the craziest EU law of all?
>
>
> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/06/11/nbook1
> 1.xml#
> 1
>
>
What I can't understand is why somebody like the Smart Group did not point
all this out to the EU before we had to put up with this expensive nonsense.
Dave
++++++++++++++++++++
David Hudson
=======================================================================
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=======================================================================
=
========================================================================
smart-e-link is an e-mail technical forum organised by the SMART Group.
Please visit our webpage (www.smartgroup.org/smtlink.htm) for subscription
information, rules of use and any questions.
smart-e-link is sponsored by LEADOUT - Low Cost Lead-Free Soldering
Technology to Improve the Competitiveness of European SMEs. LEADOUT is one
of the largest European funded projects on lead-free technologies. Visit
www.leadoutproject.com
To unsubscribe to smart-e-link, send a message to
[log in to unmask] with the following text in the BODY (NOT the
subject field): SIGNOFF smart-e-link
smart-e-link is archived on the web at
http://lists.smartgroup.org/archives/smart-e-link.html
========================================================================
-----Original Message-----
From: Leadfree [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Davy, Gordon
Sent: Monday, June 12, 2006 7:16 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [LF] NTC Lead free blog competition
John,
Thanks for the link to the Telegraph article. This is to the first
general press article on RoHS I can recall seeing that criticizes it. I
wonder if there will be more.
Gordon Davy
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