Letter of the law
I'm afraid this will demonstrate the considerable abilities of people/companies to comply assiduously with the letter of the law, while riding a coach and horses through the spirit.
There is a huge difference between 'availability of parts' and 'designing for repairability that is cost-effective and practical'. Sometimes there are arguably good reasons for designing complex integrated parts (like modern car headlight assemblies), and sometimes there may not be. I don't mind a phone being a couple of millimetres thicker and a few grams heavier if I get an easily replaceable battery and screen - but other people, apparently, do. Getting hold of foreign language keyboards is unreasonably difficult for laptops (there are, or were, sellers on eBay, but more official routes were difficult or impossible to find).
Sometimes you need special tools and/or jigs, so even if the part costs pennies, the equipment needed to replace an old part successfully costs a fortune, or is unavailable. Sometimes there are valid health and safety reasons why user-repairs are discouraged.
As others have pointed out, the embodied energy/carbon of an item makes repairing a good long-term option. I am unreasonably irritated that the vacuum cleaner hose for a Miele vacuum cleaner costs more than buying a new cleaner in the sales/special offers. The part is theoretically available, but I object to paying a king's ransom for a plastic tube that will most likely fatigue fail in same way as the original.
I will stop ranting on this topic for now. Triggered, I was.
I suspect a law will require some tweaks to get it working effectively.
NN
Biting the hand that feeds IT
