Call for creation of larger trading standards authorities in face of cuts
The Chartered Trading Standards Institute (CTSI) has called for the creation of larger trading standards authorities to replace the current structure of 200 local authority services.
The existing structure – with the prospect of further funding cuts – is “unsustainable” and “broken”, the Institute said in a letter to new Consumer Minister Nick Boles.
Calling for a strategic review, Leon Livermore, the CTSI’s chief executive, said: “Evidence is pointing to a trading standards system that has been heading for a crisis for many years now. Fantastic and essential work continues to be done by trading standards professionals all over the country, but it is no longer possible to paper over the cracks as they are getting deeper, and wider; since 2009 the number of trading standards staff has halved, and we know that more cuts are coming.”
The variation in the depth of these cuts had created a postcode lottery of protection which was not acceptable, he argued. In some cases – in the larger county councils – there were more than 50 staff in the trading standards team, whereas in some boroughs there was just one part-time officer.
Livermore said: “We are putting forward a vision of strategic trading standards authorities larger than the current units which recognise the contribution trading standards services can make in supporting economic growth, preventing crime and improving health.
“These larger services will ensure that the best use is made of available resources by pooling staff and creating economies of scale to ensure all consumers in the UK are adequately protected and businesses receive the support they need.”
The letter to the minister noted how a recent judicial review case it supported in Liverpool had shown how staff numbers were continuing to fall drastically.
The CTSI chief executive claimed that Liverpool’s case was “only one example of a growing number of local authorities seeking to reduce their trading standards service to a statutory minimum”.
He also warned that many trading standards services had reached the limit of efficiency savings.
In his letter Livermore suggested that the biggest challenge for local government in the area was the cross border impact of trading standards activity.
“With elected members under growing pressure to focus on specifically local challenges and high profile services, the impact of trading standards on problems that cross borders can be undervalued,” he argued.
“It is important to recognise that weaknesses in enforcement in one area can allow rogue traders to operate out of that area and cause detriment more widely, with implications for neighbouring authorities and those further afield.”
