Trading standards and austerity cuts
Consumers ought to be aware that Trading Standards are unlikely to be able to offer quite the same level of investigative service in the near future as the trading standards budget is the latest victim of the swingeing cuts to funding by the Government. Consumers will consequently need to be even more wary of who they buy goods and services from.
It seems that the budget for Trading Standards is to be reduced £247 million to £140 million across the 200 plus trading standards services offered. As with a number of the proposed cuts, including the budget for legal aid, opponents claim that these will be a false economy when considering the bigger picture of the country’s overall economic health and success. In terms of Trading standards, the national audit Office suggest that unfair and hard sell tactics may result in overall losses to the UK economy of over £6.5 billion per annum. If this is correct, maybe the opponents of the cuts do have a valid point ?