Minister, don’t waste money vandalising consumer protection

“a shockingly ill-conceived plan that could end up vandalising a system of consumer protection that is admired worldwide at a time when people most need protection most.”

admired worldwide?
try telling that to the FSA and their complete failure to regulate RBS which led to a £45 Billion taxpayer bailout, which is a factor in the current round of cuts all people are facing.

I agree though, this “plan” is not cost effective, will destroy what little regulation/enforcement we have left and everybody will suffer.

Regulation changed from “enforcement” to “advisory” after the Hampton report in 2005 (the same Mr Hampton who is now in charge of RBS – bonus anyone?) – which consulted “stakeholders” – which were big business, trade bodies, etc.
It was adopted in full and extended across all areas.
Focusing on rogue traders while making it almost impossible for big business to be punished for anything, in effect “head office regulation/enforcement” has failed completely.
The save money argument doesn’t stack up, as the costs of the banking fiasco are hitting us all hard in the pocket.
Save a few million per year with these changes or recognise that the Hamton principles of regulation failed completely in the banking sector and are the major cause of “rip off Britain” we see today.

Don’t take my word for it, look at the office of national statistics figures for energy prices – plodding along within mid range/manageable figures for years, until early 2005 when the hampton report came out and was announced it was being adopted across the board.
Energy prices have shot up ever since. Of course market prices have also played a part, but failing regulation putting “the needs of the business” first has led to deliberately unclear bills, doorstep mis-selling, and an energy industry dominated by the big 6, with little or no inspection.
Despite all of this, all the big 6 have kept their “compliant” status with regulator OFGEM and continue to win government contracts (don’t you EDF!)

I am the first to criticise trading standards, but they have to be given a chance. They cannot be expected to protect us and do their jobs with one hand tied behind their back. Give them decent funding instead of “saving money” all the time and let them have real powers back.

The needs of the business shouldn’t come before the needs of customers as it does now.

If the Hampton principles of “advisory” regulation failed in the biggest sector – banking – why do successive governments continue to think it will work across every other sector?
I welcome Which? stand on this and hope that others will join in and see it for what it is, regulation designed by business for the benefit of business!

Norman Lamb take note – stop pandering to businesses and start doing your job, protecting customers!

So the Government wants to shunt the responsibility onto locally devolved officials, slash funding, and then presumably blame the local officials for the inevitable failure of the service. I’ll hazard a guess that the solution to this problem will be private sector involvement. Not that I’m basing this on the identical bait-and-switch approach embodied in the NHS bill, of course….

Admired worldwide? Largely ineffective when it comes to health scams:

http://mlj.rsmjournals.com/content/80/1/13.abstract

A failure to implement Directive 2005/29/EC, placing the UK government in breach of EU law.

I have a lot of respect for the trading standards services across the country – they have always served me well when I have raised a concern with them. I think they are without fail diligent, conscientious and impartial. However, it worries me that the government even think that trading standards services could take on a significant part of the role of the OFT – not because I think they are not competent to do it but because it would lead them to taking their eye off the ball over the relatively lesser problems that give so much concern to many people and where their resources are already stretched to breaking point – like rogue traders, cold-calling, sale of fireworks, sales to juveniles, local fair trading, market and car boot sale supervision, weights & measures, licensing, pricing in licensed premises [they’ve virtually abdicated from this already], and day-to-day consumer protection generally. The major attribute of the trading standards services is that generally they are not susceptible to political influence in terms of who they take on – they tend to have a planned programme of inspections and enforcement plus a number of perpetual responsibilities varying in demand that they manage fairly well. The casework taken on by the OFT, and presumably due to be devolved to TS services, tends to be more controversial, sometimes has a political sub-text, and involves lengthy and resource-intensive investigation across wide geographical areas. It will be interesting to know what the Competition Commission is going to take on from the OFT’s present terms of reference [and whether we shall live long enough to see a result].