2.3 Market Surveillance Authorities

2.3.1      Member States must guarantee effective monitoring of products across both traditional and digital distribution channels, ensuring compliance with Regulation (EU) 2019/1020, the general product safety criteria of Regulation (EU) 2023/988, and sector-specific rules under CPR 2024.

2.3.2      Market surveillance enables non-conforming or unsafe products to be identified and removed from the market, providing a framework to penalise non-compliant economic operators. However, the primary objective remains to encourage economic operators to take voluntary corrective actions, leaving legal prosecution as a last resort in cases of clear non-cooperation.

2.3.3      Statutory enforcement powers derive from Article 14 of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020, requiring Member States to grant authorities the power to compel the provision of technical data, perform unannounced inspections, and procure samples via mystery shopping, all while adhering to the principle of proportionality.

2.3.4      For construction products, the applicable technical frameworks are governed by Chapter VIII (Articles 56 to 59, respectively) of CPR 2011 and Chapter VIII of CPR 2024 (Articles 63 to 70). In Ireland, these interconnected provisions are enforced locally exclusively by the European Union (Construction Products) Regulations 2025 (S.I. No. 669 of 2025).

2.3.5      Regulation 6(1) of S.I. No. 669 of 2025 provides that a designated Market Surveillance Authority for construction products shall be:

• A building control authority acting within its functional administrative area i.e. the 31 Building Control Authorities.
• A competent national authority appointed by the Minister i.e. Dublin city Council/National Building Control and Market Surveillance Office – NBCMSO (a shared service of the 31 Market Surveillance Authorities), the Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment/GSI, National Roads Authority/TII);
• A competent person appointed by the Minister;  
• The Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, for the purpose of issuing a national direction under Regulation 11(4) of S.I. No. 669 of 2025.

Note: S.I. No. 670/2025 - Withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union (Consequential Provisions) Act 2020 (Construction Products – Market Surveillance) (Amendment) Regulations 2025 (amending S.I. 682 of 2020), prescribes Dublin City Council/National Building Control and Market Surveillance Office – NBCMSO as a competent authority for the purposes of carrying out the functions of a market surveillance authority.