Amazon ‘should label Chinese goods’ to alert UK shoppers

Amazon should label Chinese goods more clearly so shoppers know where they’re coming from, a senior Conservative MP has said.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith told LBC radio that lots of people have told him they’d like to buy less from China because of the use of slave labour, but don’t realise where the item is made until it arrives.

The Prime Minister’s spokesman responded by saying it’s “up to individuals” to decide whether to buy Chinese products.

Amazon doesn’t list a product’s country of origin, even though manufacturers have to state in their packaging where the item was made.

It was planning to do this on its US site to comply with proposed new laws that would force online retailers to list country of origin, as part of wider competition reforms.

However, this was removed from the final version of the legislation passed in 2022. Amazon and other online retailers had lobbied hard against it, arguing it would be difficult to check a manufacturer’s claim about where a product was made.

But US lawmakers hope to force through the law in 2024 amid rising tensions with China.

India is the only major country that forces Amazon to list country of origin. Visit https://amazon.in then scroll down a product’s page and you’ll see where it was made in the Technical Details section.

Duncan Smith’s comments came after the UK Government accused China of hacking the Electoral Commission in 2021 and accessing the personal details of 40 million voters.

Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden warned that dozens of politicians had also been targeted. Authorities in the US and New Zealand said their politicians were hacked too.