Angry in the Great White North

You can read the original post, but here are the basic facts:

The item in question is any number of variations of the Yo-Yo Ball:

Considered a choking hazard, it has been banned in Canada, Australia and Britain. Health Canada issued the ban in 2003:

To: Importers, Distributors, Retailers
Immediate Prohibition of Yo-yo Type Balls and Similar Products

The purpose of this letter is to advise you that effective immediately yo-yo type balls and similar products are prohibited from advertising, sale or importation in Canada.

Yo-yo type balls and similar products are made of a soft, extremely pliable plastic. They consist of a short, but highly stretchable, plastic cord that has a liquid-filled ball-like object at one end and a finger loop at the other (see photos). The toy comes in many colours and designs, for example, spiked ball, eyeball, happy face, sport ball, insect and flashing. The toy is marketed as: "yo-ball", "yo-yo water ball", "yo-yo meteoric ball", "flashing yo-yo ball", etc.

On May 13, 2003, Health Canada issued a trade advisory to inform importers, distributors and retailers of the strangulation hazard to children posed by yo-yo type balls and similar products. At that time Health Canada requested that the product be removed from the Canadian market.

At the time I wrote the post, Party Starter in Montreal was still advertising the item in their catalog.

I wrote to Health Canada, and they responded:

In response to the information you provided, a Health Canada inspector visited the importer's warehouse and confirmed that the product is not being imported to, or sold in, Canada. As a result of the visit, the item is no longer being advertised on the importer's website.

End of story, right?

The original catalog sheet for the yo-yo ball was removed, and entering "yoyo" in their search box came up empty. But today, it's different.

The yo-yo ball is back, on a different page. Here is a screen capture:

Check out the text: Kids over the age of 3 will have a blast with this item.

Canadian authorities are quite clear that these yoyo balls are to be nowhere near children, and published the order to add the yo-yo ball to Schedule I of the Hazardous Products Act:

The Hazardous Products Act (HPA) can be used to prohibit or regulate the advertisement, sale or importation of products which are or are likely to be a danger to the health or safety of the public. Under the authority of the HPA, the Hazardous Products (Toys) Regulations were introduced in 1970 to protect children from hazardous toys. The strangulation hazard posed by yo-yo type balls and similar products is not covered under the Hazardous Products (Toys) Regulations; therefore, banning the yo-yo type balls and similar products from being advertised, sold and imported in Canada is the only efficient and rapid legal solution.

1. To continue with information programs:

Two warnings (May 13, 2003 and August 1, 2003) have been issued by HC to advise consumers about the hazard associated with yo-yo type balls and similar products, and to advise consumers to avoid purchasing the toys and to safely discard any that they have in their possession. Despite these warnings, near miss strangulation incidents continue to be reported to HC. Information programs alone have not been effective, and this option was rejected.

2. To continue with the voluntary approach:

Despite the May 13, 2003, letter that was sent to more than 1,800 relevant importers, distributors and retailers advising the industry of the hazard and requesting the removal of the toy from the marketplace, the yo-yo type balls and similar products are still being sold and were being given away at fairs and exhibitions. For this reason, the voluntary approach option was rejected.

3. To amend the Hazardous Products (Toys) Regulations:

Consideration was given to amending the Hazardous Products (Toys) Regulations such that the strangulation hazard associated with yo-yo type balls and similar products could be regulated. However, a ban on yo-yo type balls and similar products was found to achieve the same end more efficiently and effectively.

And so it was added to the Hazardous Products Act, sharing the list with lead paint and anything made of asbestos. Indeed, the yo-yo ball is the third item listed out of 41:

3. Yo-yo type balls and similar products made of a soft and pliable material and consisting of at least a ball or an object of any other shape that is attached to a stretchable cord, whether or not of the same material, that is capable of extending to at least 500 mm in length.

And if you thumb your nose at the act, it will hurt:

Contravening or not complying with Act or regulation

28. (1) Every person who contravenes or fails to comply with any provision of this Act or of any regulation made under this Act

(a) is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction and liable to a fine not exceeding one hundred thousand dollars or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to both; or

(b) is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to a fine not exceeding one million dollars or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or to both.

Officers, etc., of corporations

(2) Where a corporation commits an offence under subsection (1), any officer, director or agent of the corporation who directed, authorized, assented to, acquiesced in or participated in the commission of the offence is a party to and guilty of the offence and is liable on conviction to the punishment provided for the offence, whether or not the corporation has been prosecuted or convicted.

Is the inspector going to fall for the it-was-an-old-web-page line again? Maybe. The page does go back two years according to the Wayback Machine. The last archive was in November 2005.

Just to make sure, I tried to order the item, hoping that at some point I would be told that the item was not available.

I proceed all the way to the payment page where my credit card information would be processed without any problems:

Then I ordered it (I changed to a Quebec address to avoid shipping costs) and I received this email:

Dear Steve Janke,

Thank you for placing your order with Partystarter, Inc. Your order has been successfully received and is currently being processed. To see a summary of your order, simply click on the following link:

http://www.partystarter.com//printer_friendly.asp?order_id=xxxxxxx

If the link is not active, please copy and paste it into the address bar of your browser.

We will notify you via email when we have shipped out your items.

Sincerely,
PartyStarter.com Administration
http://www.partystarter.com
info@partystarter.com

So there you go. Despite the assurance from Health Minister Tony Clement's people that this item was gone, Party Starter still has it in the catalog, still has text encouraging people to give it to their three-year-old children, and will process the order in Canadian dollars to ship to a Canadian address without any hesitation.

There is still a window of opportunity here for Party Starter to spike the order. I'll let you know how it goes. But even advertising the product contravenes the Act, and given that they've already been made aware of the problem, the situation is strange. And what is stranger still is that the original order page I found in November was removed, but then this one has re-appeared, a page that was last archived in 2005, suggesting it has been gone ever since. It didn't appear when I first searched their site for "yoyo" in November. But now it's back.

Sounds to me the inspector ought to conduct a return visit. Better yet, order the yoyo balls himself, just to convince himself that this is not just one of those website oversights.

Update: When I placed a call to the firm, the person who answered said they don't sell the product anymore, but no one can explain the website still advertises the product (an offence under the Hazardous Products Act), or why it seems to take an order. Of course, maybe this is all the inspector did.