Buy now if you're looking for a powerful vacuum cleaner, as new rules about to come into force will soon restrict the motor sizes available.From 1 September 2014, a new EU energy label for vacuum cleaners means manufacturers will not be able to make or import vacuums with a motor that exceeds 1,600 watts. Best Buy-recommended models have motor sizes that exceed this - so if you're in the market for a powerful vacuum, you should act quickly before all of the models currently available sell out. Despite what is being widely reported by some other media outlets, a large motor size does not guarantee impressive suction. Our independent testing has found many Best Buy vacuums under 1600w, proving that clever engineering and a well-designed floorhead are equally, if not more important, than a powerful motor. View our exclusive list of all current Best Buy vacuum cleaners.But this isn't to say that the new energy label won't change the market - it will. For starters, from 2017 the maximum decibel level of a vacuum cleaner will be restricted to 80db.

If this restriction came in tomorrow, it would wipe out more than 90% of the upright vacuum cleaner market. It will be interesting to see if manufacturers can adapt their upright models in time.For the first time, the labels will give vacuum cleaners A to G ratings for energy use, cleaning performance on hard floors and carpets, dust emission and noise. The label also requires a minimum level of performance for the vacuum to be sold in the EU, which is great news and will hopefully cut some of the very poor models from the market.If you vacuum a 100 metre squared house once a week, a Best Buy 2,200w vac will cost around £27 a year to run in electricity - around £8 more than the best 1,600w we have tested.Each EU country has a market surveillance authority to check that models comply with the EU tests and are capable of the ratings that the manufacturers have applied. At Which?, we will be awaiting the results of this independent testing with interest.We have already seen manufacturers that have traditionally fared poorly in our testing out-scoring manufacturers that have achieved many Best Buy recommendations over the years. 

As well as this, and unlike our own testing, the performance ratings in the new label do not take account of 'dust loading'. Many vacuum cleaners lose suction as they pick up dust in their bag or container. vacuum cleaners with allergen filtrationThe new label does not take account of this and only requires manufacturers to rate their model when it is brand new and completely free of dust.hoover vacuum cleaner reviewHave some previously lower scoring manufacturers suddenly come across a winning suction formula? nilfisk vacuum cleaners for homeWe are looking forward to getting the next batch of vacuum cleaners to our test lab to find out.It is not often that this column speaks kindly of the EU, but I’m afraid all that hyper-ventilating about how Brussels is trying to save the planet by “banning” our vacuum cleaners misses the point of a rather interesting story.

As one tabloid front page screamed: “Now kettles face EU ban: Brussels meddlers in new assault on our way of life.” In fact, there is no “ban” on powerful vacuums, kettles, hair dryers or anything else. What Brussels is doing, under its Ecodesign Directive 2009/125, is to encourage manufacturers to develop appliances that require less electricity to produce a much more efficient performance. We had technical experts last week trying to explain this, even on the BBC’s You and Yours programme, but their common sense was drowned out by the wave of hysteria over “Brussels meddlers”. There is not even a ban on appliances that use more power than necessary. Since the directive refers only to “domestic” use, it is still possible, as with light bulbs, to buy vacuum cleaners above the new power limit, so long as these are for “commercial or industrial” use. Sir James Dyson tells us that he could make a machine just as effective as the 2,000 to 3,000 watt models being “banned”, using only 700 watts.

Brussels is following moves in the US to reduce electricity demand by switching to appliances that are much more efficient; washing machines are now on sale that have cut energy use by 75 per cent, are 45 per cent cheaper – and even wash clothes better. This is all part of a drive to promote “demand side management”, by devising ways to cut electricity demand without reducing performance. Demand-side management may be particularly popular in Europe because of the need to accommodate all those absurdly expensive wind turbines and solar panels which are so inefficient and unreliable at producing electricity. But it is still a sensible step, which could save us having to build three or four more proper power stations. Perhaps Brussels could now consider making it illegal to produce kettles that last only a year or two before we have to buy new ones? Ashya King and his parents Social workers’ sinister use of Interpol to chase families in Europe One group of parents would have followed with particular sympathy the plight of the King family after they had been tracked down by police across Europe, bent on seizing their sick son Ashya, even though at the time there was no court order to make such a heavy-handed response legal.

These are families who have found themselves similarly pursued across Europe by Interpol at the behest of British social workers. Last November I reported the experience of Carl and Katy Brown who had fled to France for fear that their first child would be seized at birth by the social workers of Mid-Bedfordshire. When, shortly after giving birth in a French hospital, Katy returned to her room after a shower, covered in nothing but a towel, she was horrified to find it filled with 10 French policemen. They showed her a note from Interpol containing luridly inaccurate claims from British social workers that she posed a serious threat to her child’s safety. Without any order from a court, the baby was already gone. As I reported later in February, only thanks to a robust French judge and supportive French social workers, was the family finally reunited. Carl and Katy collected their daughter from an orphanage, in a room full of other babies in cots, where she had been for the first three months of her life.