Ron Gainsford

Red Tape Challenge - Again

2011-07-29T08:19:00.000-07:00

If you are in trading standards or another of the 'regulatory' (not a descriptor I am at all fond of but central and local government seem to insist?!) or public protection professions you get used to but no less weary of being described by politicians and similarly slavishly by their officials as a 'burden' on business. There is always the occasional and convenient anecdote available to illustrate this of course which feeds the policy by anecdote appetite but does little to paint the real picture. Trading standards has been a 'better regulation' profession long before it became a soundbite for politicians many of whom had been party to the imposition of red tape burdens in the first place as making new legislation too often has been the response to any new malpractice etc. We invented the 'home authority' principle which businesses of all sizes have found so supportive for 40 years and which Government and Parliament have since extended to the 'primary authority' principle in tandem. Good. Some rules can be daft and no longer fit with our modern needs. Why would you want to impose controls on the sale of chocolate liqueurs or Christmas crackers? So when Vince Cable made his announcement yesterday that the Red Tape Challenge is to see 160 regulations scrapped in the retail sector I raised another weary and muted cheer but with a resigned eye to looking for his applause of the burdens that my trading standards peers lift from small, medium and big business rather than impose. One day perhaps......although to be fair he has said that we are the most important front line service together with CAB in the entire consumer landscape so that gives us hope!

Olympics need trading standards

2011-02-28T07:46:00.000-08:00

The 2012 Olympics. A big thing for trading standards. Today I chaired a meeting of trading standards colleagues from the London councils and from local authorities outside of London who are hosting events.

Big concerns about the lack of resources to tackle the counterfeiters, ticket touts and other rogues who will look to hijack the Olympic Games opportunity to rip off consumers, UK and overseas visitors, and leave a bad taste in the mouths of those who will be here to enjoy the spectacle and the experience.

The good thing is that I can see the professionalism and resolve of trading standards practitioners kicking in. The bad thing is that they need much more real help from central and local government and from the Olympic authorities and business to be able to keep the Olympic parks and the hinterland fair and clean of consumer crime. I shall be writing to Ministers and others to press the case even at this late hour.

Change Happens

2011-02-28T07:31:00.000-08:00

So much happening in the trading standards arena that I can hardly draw breath.

The BIS consumer landscape review, the planned abolition of the OFT, Consumer Focus and more, the suggested centralising of enforcement by the Food Standards Agency, the creation of the new Financial Conduct Authority and the possible transfer of consumer credit regulation to Canary Wharf from the OFT.....are all but part of the turbulence we currently are navigating.

I was on Radio 4 You and Yours today. I was asked about the changes I had seen in my 40 plus years in trading standards and consumer affairs. There were many of course and setting up the OFT in 1973 was a big one. Now that is to go and I made the point that the changes being condensed into these past months and the next two years will more than outpace those of the previous 40.

At the same time my trading standards colleagues across the country are having to cope with increasing demand alongside decreasing capacity as funding cuts of 40% start to bite. Their will to win however remains undaunted and they will look to new ways to support the consumers and businesses that need them.
By the way - the Financial Conduct Authority was to be the Consumer Protection and Markets Authority. A pity somebody changed their mind because the 'consumer' word should be there!

Trading standards and wealth creation

2011-01-25T11:49:00.000-08:00

Today's last quarter report on the state of the UK economy has obviously raised eyebrows here and overseas at our disappointing performance. The Chancellor apparently blamed the bad weather 17 times in a lunchtime interview. The same snow and ice doesn't seem to have hurt the German economy though? We should all be worried at this lack of growth because it hurts us all.

I've always said that trading standards is part of wealth creation in its support for business, consumers and therefore the economy. News stories like today's throw up all sorts of mind blowing statistics. For example UK manufacturing grew in the last quarter by 3.3%. I thought 'great' until the commentators deflated that little bit of good news by telling us that manufacturing only accounts for 12% of GDP. Only 12% which means 88% is made up of non manufacturing service industries etc.

I knew the industrial revolution was long behind us but that 12% still surprised me. I wonder what the German or French figures are? Must find out.

FSA Chief seeks new consumer safeguards

2011-01-25T10:28:00.000-08:00

Today's FT carried the heading 'FSA chief seeks new consumer safeguards'. The pink newspaper is always worth a look but never more so than when it talks 'consumer protection' and I was certainly drawn to its headline this morning. I'm sure Lord Turner's remarks and timely interest in consumer protection is not unconnected with the anticipated relocation of consumer credit regulation from the OFT to the new FSA, Financial Services Authority, successor body (or one of them) the Consumer Protection and Markets Authority, CPMA.

The tried and trusted Consumer Credit Act looks likely to give way to a new Financial Services Act. Canary Wharf has never been what I would call close to front line consumers and nor to front line trading standards. In the new world of the CPMA and the already up and running Consumer Financial Education Board I very much hope that those bodies and people can relate to ordinary consumers and even trading standards officers. The lifts in Canary Wharf can quickly get you down from a great height to ground level. That is where consumer credit controls and enforcement against the terror of loan sharks have to be real.

Consumer Direct onwards

2011-01-21T05:00:00.000-08:00

I've been looking at 'The Citizen' news journal published by Citizen's Advice. Glad to see it led by a foreword they kindly asked me to write. Its inclusion helps to symbolise the emerging importance of the new and ever stronger relationship that will exist between trading standards and Trading Standards Institute with Citizen's Advice and CABx together with Citizen's Advice Scotland.

This is the new world being prompted by the 'consumer landscape' proposals of Vince Cable and his BIS team. First we need to secure the future of the successor service that CAB will have to construct from Consumer Direct. This has become part of the backbone of trading standards and cannot be lost.

It is clear to me though that from the top down Citizen's Advice and CAS are as determined as we are to see an even better successor in place by April 2012 latest. The new chief executives of both organisations and their teams continue to impress and that was reinforced when I met again with Gillian Guy at Citizen's Advice yesterday. She clearly has all the right qualities to lead her organisation into its extended future and also to help lead their new partnership with trading standards.

More speed less haste

2011-01-17T09:45:00.000-08:00

Interesting to hear the Prime Minister being interviewed/interrogated by John Humphrys this morning. The PM in effect saying that 'all change' was the order of the day and there is no time to waste. Humphrys was saying that it is all too quick, mistakes will be made etc. They focused on the NHS and Andrew Lansley's mission to rid us of PCTs and localise decision making to GPs (whether they are ready or not?).

Has the PM really put Oliver Letwin and Danny Alexander on his shoulder just in case he is running too enthusiastically?

I can't help but relate these conversations to the trading standards world I am closest to. I accept that any Government will look to get the bad news out of the way in the first half of it's reign so the preoccupation with speed rather than distance is to be expected. But we only need to look at the Parliamentary debates around the Public Bodies Bill which seeks to abolish consumer relevant organisations like Consumer Focus and the Office of Fair Trading to know that there are real concerns around 'more haste less speed'.

It feels like we are all caught in extra turbulent waters. The key is to know how to swim and not sink.

We are all in this together?

2011-01-11T12:24:00.000-08:00

Not one of the better days in my trading standards life (40 years of it now!). These are very difficult times for so many of my professional friends and colleagues. Some of the pillars that have become such a familiar part of the trading standards world are crumbling before our eyes.

LACOTS was set up as the trading standards coordinating body in 1978. I worked for it for 13 years from 1989. It has done a fantastic job and is a real success story. Genuine value for money.

It became LACORS and then the Local Government Regulation, LGR, and I always feared for its future when it moved under the same roof as its parent the Local Government Association -feared for its independence and its top slice funding both of which were its core strengths.

Now it is to go and quickly, a victim of the Local Government Association, LGA, losing subscribers and money and a 38% cut over 4 years in top slice funds to the central bodies like the LGR.

Trading standards needs the LGR and never more so than now, but that won't persuade the LGA. Now therefore is the time to stay together, to keep close, to take strength from being a team working to fill the huge void left by LGR. But others see it differently and see opportunity. I try to understand them. I'm glad I'm not easily depressed.

Three Lions show us the way

2011-01-08T04:55:00.000-08:00

Wasn't it great to see an England cricket team wear the three lions with such pride and purpose?

Their resounding Ashes victory down under has given so many of us, whether cricket fans or not, a wonderful boost at the start of this new year. They have illustrated what teamwork, preparation, courage and determination can achieve. All those qualities are required for trading standards and for TSI in this extraordinary year of change and transformation ahead.

The three lions boys have shown that belief and a positive attitude can turn the odds in your favour and ultimately secure success. An inspiration and very timely too.

Talking of lions I hope that another pride of Lions will be similarly inspired to turn the odds in their favour too when they entertain Birmingham City in the FA Cup third round at The Den today. I'll be there to cheer them onto victory.

Another boost when we all need it most. Taking part is fine but playing well and winning...there is no better feeling whether in work or recreation. Welcome again 2011. We are ready for you!

Loan Sharks and Scams

2011-01-04T09:27:00.000-08:00

Not everyone knows what an incredible and courageous job many of my trading standards friends do in tackling the menace of illegal money lending. The Government via BIS has funded a handful of teams to bring loan sharks to task and they have been spectacularly successful.

More than 500 loan sharks have been arrested, £37million of illegal debts have been written off, over £1.3million cash has been seized from the sharks, 16,000 victims have been helped, and £20million of assets are being investigated with a view to removing these from illegal money lenders.

The return on the funds provided has been immense and we have all been working hard to ensure that the funds did not fall foul of the Government's cuts to public spending. Imagine our delight when we saw the Consumer Minister Ed Davey MP announce on 28 December that funding would continue for this work and for our scambuster teams for the next year and probably to 2013.

In these cash strapped times for ordinary people the loan sharks are only too eager to sink their teeth into those desperate for money. That's is when the cycle of ever growing repayments and potential threats begins. Loan sharks beware.

Hooray for Trading standard officers and MBEs

2011-01-04T09:13:00.000-08:00

It was brilliant to see two of my trading standards colleagues awarded MBEs in the New Years Honours list. Fantastic.

Martin Woodley does a great job in Oxfordshire in leading the fight against doorstep crime. Too many hard-pressed people are taken to the cleaners by rogues and criminals that see them as fleecing targets. They have no hearts or conscience and think nothing of robbing the elderly and others of their life savings. Martin and his team work closely with the police and other agencies to track them down and his MBE award is richly deserved.

Similarly Peter Aston has done an exceptional job in supporting consumers across the north west of England. He runs Warrington and Halton trading standards services and is one of those guys who leaves no stone unturned in his determination to help those who need help. If there isn't a solution on the shelf he'll look to invent one and he has been an inspiration to many trading standards professionals who work their socks off in support of honest people and businesses. Both suffer at the hands of the cowboys if they are allowed to run unchecked. Martin and Peter are two examples of trading standards professionals who live to stop that happening.

Trading Standards in a fight for survival

2010-12-21T06:31:00.000-08:00

We really are in a fight for survival.

I'm seeing local councils imposing cuts of 40 and 50% on their trading standards service budgets. Most of those services are too small anyway and to have to absorb that sort of hit will prove injurious at best and fatal at worst.

Yesterday BBC Breakfast did a short expose of the work and risk TS faces. Trading standards is a real force for the good. I think the BBC understands that. Most of its viewers will. I'm not sure though if the Local Government Minister Bob Neill MP does.

For the purposes of the BBC programme he gave a statement "Every bit of the public sector needs to do its bit to help pay off the massive budget deficit. Government has been living a credit card lifestyle and its time to pay off the bills. Town hall trading standards should focus their finite resources where public welfare is most at risk. This means tackling the like of cowboy builders and shops which peddle alcohol to children, but not wasting time on prosecuting greengrocers for using imperial scales."

Either the minister knows too little of the work and impact of trading standards or he just sees it as fair game for a political shot. Believe me minister if you did take the trouble to experience just a day with my trading standards colleagues you would see the intelligence driven and courageous way in which they tackle fraud, crime, scams, illegal sales of alcohol, tobacco, knives and more to the young and never give a thought to greengrocers selling in imperial or metric.

You should be applauding trading standards and helping it sustain its help to consumers and businesses in need, not looking to throw a poorly informed brick at it when it needs your support most. After all, your coalition government colleague Vince Cable MP has just recently stated the value he at least attaches to front line trading standards. Perhaps you don't agree?

Christmas Spirit??

2010-12-17T09:34:00.000-08:00

Christmas really started for me yesterday evening when I attended the Carol Concert for the National Hospital Development Foundation, NHDF, at St. George's Church, Queen Square, London.

It was a beautiful scene with snow falling which certainly put me in the mood. The NHDF is the fund raising charity for the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery and I have looked to support it because of the debt I owe the hospital as a patient and have raised funds over several years.

I was really pleased because the NHDF asked me to do a reading at the concert. Although I'm used to public speaking this was different and especially as the other readers were professional and well known actors. Nonetheless I caught my breath and read 'A Small Dry Voice' from 'Memories of Christmas' by Dylan Thomas. It was great fun and if you haven't read it yourself then I can recommend it as a starter for this festive season.

Then back to the harsh world of today and in my trading standards capacity I have been reminded of the crooks, scoundrels and cheats who use Christmas to fleece, scam and rob the vulnerable.

Loan sharks preying on those they know can't afford to buy presents for their loved ones. Counterfeiters passing off fakes as the real thing to unwary consumers. So at the festive time of year spare a thought for those that know nothing of the Christmas spirit and look only to crooked gain at the expense of others. Work with trading standards to stop them.

Public Health Officers return to town halls

2010-12-14T09:18:00.000-08:00

Public health officers are set to return to the town hall across England in what ministers are describing as the biggest shift in power in 40 years. Amazing. The Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has said in his White Paper 'Healthy Lives, Healthy People' that councils will be tasked with improving public health and fighting obesity, alcohol, drugs, smoking and more. Ring fenced funding of £4bn may follow.

This is all very timely given the news this morning that a third of those living in the west midlands are obese. That is frightening and I really hope that councils have the appetite for their new public health role and digest it well. They should look seriously to their trading standards and environmental health practitioners to play a major part as their Public Health Officers.
Another reason not to slash and burn their budgets and to invest in their capability and future.

Let's hope they can and will use some of that ring fenced money to do so. I can see us knocking on the doors of the new Directors of Public Health. Let's hope they are open doors.

Job losses too big to handle

2010-12-14T09:04:00.000-08:00

Why does it feel like we are losing more than we are gaining? Probably because it is true. I've just finished my monthly task of writing my column for our TS Today magazine. I am usually inspired at the prospect (seriously!) but this time I was composing my thoughts on the back of the massive funding cuts to the grants to local councils announced by the Government yesterday. The Local Government Association, LGA, are predicting 140,000 job losses.

I fear for so many of my trading standards friends and colleagues, our TSI members. They are all fantastic professionals dedicated to their task but this funding sword is being waved in all directions as it cuts the flesh and bones of council services. TSI is 130 years old next year and our members have always been predominantly employed in local government. The health of the profession is entwined with the health of local authorities. Their sickness is our sickness. I don't blame councils because they have an impossible task in trying to balance priorities. That doesn't mean that I feel like staying in the same emergency ward as them though. There has to be another way if we are to sustain the trading standards profession as we know it and that is where my interest is. Inspiration returning!

Trading Standards or Tuition Fees?!

2010-12-10T09:08:00.000-08:00

It's been another manic week for me and for us all at TSI. The Government's plans to change the machinery for consumer representation and protection, to abolish quangos and others and to use the broad shoulders of trading standards to carry even more of a consumer enforcement role is really churning the waters. I hope those shoulders can withstand the weight but with councils cutting their already meagre budgets by 30-40 percent even the strongest of trading standards services are going to wobble or fall.

What a day we chose yesterday too to take our trading standards case to Parliament! We had to run the gauntlet of thousands of protesting students, police and barriers to reach the House of Commons and then once we were inside and ready to lobby MPs and Peers we fell foul of a little debate on tuition fees!

Not to be deterred we scoured the building and managed to grab the attention of those MPs that had taken a break from the debating chamber and I am sure that they will all have been convinced by the strength of our case. The country without a strong front line trading standards workforce is unthinkable at a time when people and businesses needs them most.

Never a dull moment and the best way to take a break from a week like that is to get on my motorbike and enjoy that tarmac - snow and ice permitting!

From Strasbourg to Basildon

2010-12-06T14:03:00.000-08:00

A very helpful meeting with our most recent TSI Vice President Malcolm Harbour MEP today. From his vantage point as Chairman of the European Parliament Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee we talked around a range of matters ranging from consumer product safety to commercial practices to the Services directive and through to improving the resilience of business between Europe, China and the USA.

TSI delivers the UK European Consumer Centre and the equivalent for Services and we look forward to inviting Malcolm to see more of our good work in helping consumers via our contact centres and web services at our TSI head office in Basildon.

We are fortunate at TSI in having so many advocates and supporters not only in the UK Parliaments but also in Strasbourg and Brussels. I think they all recognise TSI and trading standards as a genuine force for the good and lend their help and always wise counsel in a very encouraging way. We shall see some of this on Thursday of this week when we take a TSI roadshow into the Westminster Parliament and illustrate to MPs and Peers the fantastic work that my trading standards colleagues around the country do for people, businesses and communities.

Look out for the Cowboys

2010-12-05T05:14:00.000-08:00

You can be sure that as the snow melts and reveals the damage done to roofs, drives, drains and more then the cowboys will be out and about knocking on doors and looking for those that are most vulnerable to being ripped off.

Time to be careful and cautious and to do your best to know who you may be doing business with. TSI remains on record as calling for a complete ban on cold calling by property maintenance people but our calls continue to fall on deaf ears. I remain astonished that in this 21st century UK we don't have any reliable way by which consumers can choose a trader to repair or improve their home. We have a plethora of different schemes but none of which are significant enough to appeal to needy consumers.

Some schemes are run by the commercial sector and others by the public sector, many by my trading standards colleagues such as 'Buy With Confidence'. What we need is a mark and brand that enjoys high levels of consumer confidence and awareness. For example the 'kitemark' was once known to and seen by consumers as a mark of product quality. We have made such poor progress over the past twenty years and its about time we tackled the challenge.

Oh well and before I get too depressed......at least my Millwall Lions won 3-0 and moved up to 11th in The Championship!

Localism and Devolution -it must be right?!

2010-12-02T06:13:00.000-08:00

Localism rules and devolvement sort of rules. I say 'sort of' because we are only part way along the exploratory journey of the evolvement of devolvement of Westminster powers and responsibilities to Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast.

Consumer affairs laws remain for example largely reserved to the Westminster Parliament. This has meant that my trading standards colleagues in Scotland and Wales have always laboured under the handicap of being seen by Holyrood and local government politicians and officials there as being in a service that itself is devolved but is delivering largely reserved matters.

That isn't helpful to them and their services have suffered accordingly. Indeed they are but a shadow of the pre-1996 local trading standards services. Now Scotland, for example, is talking of galvanising the police and fire services into perhaps a single Scotland police service or four fire boards.

There is a window of opportunity for trading standards there to be part of these new structures. I think there is general acceptance now that 32 trading standards services in Scotland is not conducive to future impact and effect. This leads to the point that 'localism' is not always right for services, like trading standards, that also have to have a strategic role. Localism is a strapline for this coalition government and I understand the point.

But then I hear the Transport Secretary saying this morning that he will investigate why some councils are gritting roads better than others. Obviously he wants to see the national road grid kept open and consistently so. Quite right. But localism rules Mr Hammond and councils must be able to choose whether they spend cash on rock salt or trading standards. That's right isn't it??!!

2010-11-30T02:14:00.001-08:00

This is International Consumer Safety Week and I am at the International Consumer Product, Health and Safety Conference in London.

Delegates are here from all over the globe, and all involved in making the world a safer place for children and adults. They are from all sectors including governments, the EU, regulators, lawyers, businesses and consumers.

Lots of discussion on hazard data, risk and communication of risk, market surveillance, fair competition, piracy and counterfeiting. It is fascinating to see how danger warnings are now being communicated to consumers via U Tube, Twitter, Flicker, Blog and more.

In the USA next year an interactive database will be launched on which consumers will log their own unsafe product experiences. A real challenge for public authorities as to how they respond and for businesses too. In the UK consumer safety is one of the many roles performed by trading standards including the checking of imported products at ports with Customs. Successive recent Governments however have behaved as if the problems are all over. If only.

We don't know the scale of any problem however because in 2002 the Government stopped funding the UK injury database. It is a head in the sand policy that needs to be reverted especially as we are now so out of step with our EU and international trading partners.

Energy Selling - No Cold Calling

2010-11-26T13:08:00.000-08:00

I was struck by today's announcement by the energy regulator OFGEM that it is to look at the profits being made by the six primary energy companies. Are they playing fair? Alastair Buchanan the OFGEM CEO suggests that they may not be.

Of course if the energy market to consumers was truly competitive then consumers should be confident in their ability to shop around, switch supplier and secure the best deals around. But I think many are asking just how truly competitive the market is with seemingly each supplier following suit when it comes to raising prices. It always just seems a matter of time before they are all on the same hymn sheet.

This comes on the heels of the concerns recently expressed as to whether the energy companies are all complying with the new Code intended to aid transparency of pricing when it comes to, for example, doorstep selling. At TSI we have been saying for three years that the doorstep cold call selling of energy is outmoded and unfit for a 21st century consumer energy market.

The OFGEM Code is intended to be its last chance saloon to prove that the industry can cold call cleanly. Alas I see no future for such a crude selling method for such an increasingly high cost product. The more expensive our gas and electricity gets the more inappropriate doorstep persuasion and selling is. I look forward to one day seeing Alastair Buchanan agree.

A Leap of Faith?

2010-11-12T00:08:00.000-08:00

It's been quite a week - again. Tuesday saw the House of Lords debate the 2nd reading of the Public Bodies Bill. A Lords constitutional committee had earlier been extraordinarily critical of the Bill and the proposed use by Government of secondary legislation to ignite its quangos bonfire and limit Parliamentary debate - the so called Henry VIII process.

On Tuesday scores of Peers queued up to say their piece on the Bill, mostly expressing concerns about the Bill itself but also about the many public bodies affected by proposed abolition or change. Trading standards, Citizens Advice, local government, and Consumer Focus all featured. There was even a quarrel over the definition of what is a consumer. There was clearly considerable concern across the floor over the proposed loss of consumer law enforcement from the OFT.

Is this really a sensible time to place even greater reliance on local authorities who are even as I type having or choosing to slash their trading standards budgets? Lord Borrie, a previous OFT Director General quoted my words from our latest TSI TS Today publication: 'a leap of faith, I just hope it isn't a leap in the dark'.

Time will tell but I sense we are only at the beginning of this quantum leap.

A Consumer Minister...and much more

2010-11-09T01:10:00.000-08:00

Seeing and hearing Ed Davey MP on television and radio this morning reminded me that the portfolios carried by modern day junior Ministers in Government are impossibly large. There he was talking for the Government on its plans for the post office network and the levels of investment to be made and there I am wondering how he manages to spread his time between such a spread of key roles.

His job title of Minister for Employment Relations, Consumers and Postal Affairs perhaps makes my point. Ed Davey is a very able and very likable man and I have had the pleasure of meeting with him several times. He performed admirably this morning in articulating the Government case. Similarly when he was on 'Question Time' recently he was clearly able to contribute his personal, his LibDem Party's and the Government's position robustly on a range of topics including his views on the London Mayor' interventions in the housing benefits debate.

My point is that today's consumers in our UK society deserve and should demand that any Government has a 'Consumer Minister' with a portfolio that only includes them and provides a focal point for and across Government, is an advocate for consumers in Whitehall and Westminster and is not otherwise having to spread him or herself so thinly, albeit so ably, over such a broad political and subject canvas. Consumers are the lifeblood of our economy and they deserve such bespoke attention.

TSI president calls upon council leaders to recognise 'extraordinary circumstances'

2010-11-05T09:53:00.000-07:00

Yesterday our TSI President, Baroness Christine Crawley, kindly hosted myself and a TSI team in the House of Lords.

First we all met with Baroness Royall to talk about the issues raised by the Public Bodies Bill for trading standards, consumers and legitimate business and how she might respond, as leader of the opposition, to these concerns. Her interest and support are a fantastic boost to TSI.

Baroness Crawley then took time out of her hectic schedule to personally sign more than 200 letters to leaders of councils calling for them to recognise the 'extraordinary circumstances' trading standard services face and the need for sustained funding.

Those letters went out last night. This morning they should be in the hands of the people who can and will influence the funding of trading standards services. I hope they appreciate that these are indeed, as Christine says, 'extraordinary circumstances' and take action to sustain the funding needed to support the vital work done to protect consumers and legitimate business.

Supporting small business

2010-11-01T10:43:00.000-07:00

Good to see that the Prime Minister has asked Lord Young to take a hard look at how small and medium sized businesses can be helped more. Small and Medium Enterprises, SMEs, employ 60% of the workforce and are major players in our UK economic recovery ambitions, including the switch from a reducing public sector workforce to a growing private sector one.

It surprises some to know that the Trading Standard Institute,TSI, is a self-financing not for profit SME as well as a professional body representing trading standards practitioners. Our members work in both the public and private sectors too and that makes us uniquely well placed to understand the pressures and burdens on small businesses. We should be extraordinarily well placed to comment to Lord Young. He says he wants to listen and so I shall be sending an invitation.

I always say that front line trading standards people are as much about wealth creation as those in front line business. Why would they want to do anything but work with and support good business, enterprise and employment? It suits government sometimes to paint trading standards and other local government based regulators as a burden rather than the help they actually are. It's my job to help Lord Young appreciate that.

Goodbye Regional Development Agencies

2010-10-29T05:24:00.000-07:00

I was interested yesterday to see Vince Cable announce the first 25 LEPS, Local Enterprise Partnerships. I shall be curious to see how many more follow and whether the loss of the RDAs, Regional Development Agencies, proves to be significant to the economic wellbeing of different regions in England.

Regionalism and localism are not easy bedfellows and that is not always of help to local trading standards services who need to always have a framework to combine talent, effort and capacity to maximise impact in favour of consumers, good business, local and yes regional economies. The government funding available to support LEPS looks to be about a third of that which had rested with the RDAs. Only time will tell whether this suffices.

At the moment there are vast gaps in the spread of LEPS and areas and regions like Lancashire and the South West will have no enterprise body to bid for central funds until, and if, they establish LEPS. Critics have labelled LEPS as a fragmented network of toothless talking shops. Let us hope they are wrong.

The Local Growth White Paper, launched this week by Nick Clegg, pins hopes on councils being better enterprise supporters and catalysts. It also recognises the key role of well maintained trading standards for that purpose. Bottom up regionalism built on the new found localism will be essential to trading standards services performing as Mr Clegg wants. LEPS and political preferences should not get in the way of operational and strategic pragmatism.

Funding for trading standards

2010-10-29T02:42:00.000-07:00

This is always a big issue for a small service especially when delivered by cash strapped councils who have now been told by the Chancellor that they can expect 27% less Government funding over the next 4 years.

The norm seems to be that trading standards services across the country are being told to find savings of 25%-40% which looks like the normal salami slicing approach towards council services that don't enjoy the funding protection of ring fenced money. So it was encouraging to meet with BIS, Business, Innovation and Skills, officials yesterday to further understand how the BIS 'consumer landscape' proposals might translate into funding support for reinforcing the trading standards role that Vince Cable has attached such weight to.

BIS will look to transfer current, and perhaps new funds currently held centrally, to local government to support the essential national enforcement role of trading standards in areas like illegal money lending, scams and fraud, intel, e-commerce, regional and national coordination and more.

These funds currently expire in 2011 but I could see yesterday how resolved BIS is to sustain that funding for at least the four years after that. That will send a strong message to local authorities and we shall want to ensure they look to reinforce their trading standards capability, not salami slice and disable it.

Business and the consumer landscape

2010-10-27T02:16:00.000-07:00

TSI has a very good relationship with the business community and its representative organisations. This mirrors the trading standards ethic of being a shared champion of business and consumers. Our TSI Annual Conference and Exhibition (in 2011 at the Bournemouth International Centre 21-23 June) is a high impact affair and any visitor would immediately see the support it and we enjoy from the broad spectrum of the private enterprise sector together with those in the public and third sectors.

This Government has staked the country's economic and employment prospects on business and it is important that the sector plays its fullest part in how we progress and implement the BIS plans for the new consumer landscape including driving new levels of consumer empowerment via advice, information, education and ensuring competition flourishes and rogues are eliminated from local and national markets. Trading standards is central to all this and business will be as concerned as consumers to see that local trading standards services are not themselves dis empowered by cuts by councils to their already stretched budgets.

So yesterday I started to widen my discussions with business on the importance of it being the third pillar in the new consumer landscape being scoped by Vince Cable and his BIS team. Trading standards and Citizens Advice may be the two pillars he has so far spotlighted but business has to be embraced as the third if the new model is to work. I am sure that business will be up for the challenge and in the week that saw both the Prime Minister and Opposition Leader at a CBI Conference it is worth reiterating the Prime Minister's and the Chancellor's clarion call that 'we are all in this together'.

Building the new consumer landscape begins......

2010-10-25T08:14:00.000-07:00

When Vince Cable issued his BIS consumer landscape review statement earlier this month he made it very clear that the future was to be built on the twin pillars of Citizens Advice and Trading Standards.

TSI and its members delivering trading standards across the local government spectrum have always had a strong and productive relationship with Citizens Advice and with the nearly 400 CABx spread across England and Wales. Similarly with Citizens Advice Scotland and its member CABx.

Following the Secretary of State's announcement however, that relationship must reach new levels of collaboration and productivity. We must seek to ensure the transfer of the Consumer Direct GB helpline to Citizens Advice serves to be even more supportive of consumers, and trading standards services and the business community. They have a reliance on its information and data in the improvement of business behaviour towards consumers and the enforcement of consumer and other criminal law against the rogue element.

Today I met with the CEO of Citizens Advice and together we have begun to create the foundations of the new consumer landscape with our two organisations at its heart. We shall need to embrace many others, including local government, the private sector and our colleagues in the devolved nations. We are confident of meeting the challenge set by the coalition Government but we shall need its wholehearted support. There is little time to waste.

Local Government Funding takes a real hit

2010-10-22T05:56:00.000-07:00

Local government has suffered a real body blow in losing 27% of its central funding over the next 4 years. Quite how such savage cuts can hope to give councils a fighting chance of using their new found localism opportunity is at the moment beyond me. Shifting service, operational and funding roles and responsibilities away from the state i.e. Government to town halls would be a challenge at any time but to do so and in parallel take away substantive funds is an unenviable one.

Small but essential front line services like Trading Standards are incredibly vulnerable regardless of any urgings from BIS or other parts of Government to councils to support them. When the Leader of the Local Government Group talks of the loss of 'dedicated professionals' as part of the 1 in 10 council jobs to go over these next four years we have to be concerned at the prospective loss of Trading Standards professionals so critical to supporting businesses, consumers and communities at this time of need.

Local authorities have to find different ways of delivering services and we are seeing some respond already by merging operations, outsourcing and similar. We must help them to make the right decisions for Trading Standards and the citizens that rely on them.

Consumer landscape announcements

2010-10-20T08:38:00.000-07:00

We welcome continuity of the limited funding to be cascaded to local government for national threats. Clearly a trading standards that is adequately and appropriately funded can step up to the plate to deliver its new found responsibility. At the same time, however, the capability and impact of local trading standards services and practitioners is going to be dependent upon councils adequately funding them. No easy task for councils regardless of the leap of faith shown by the Secretary of State.

The Institute is a long-standing but progressive organisation that seeks to support modern local government together with consumers and businesses. Our members are spread across the public and private sectors which positions us well to understand the demands on both.

Modern high street and internet driven markets need confident, informed consumers if they are to work well and if rogues are not to flourish. Trading standards is central to recovering and ultimately flourishing local, national and indeed web based global market place. Similarly to the economic and safe wellbeing of consumers. This is no time to do other than reinforce the capacity and capability of trading standards and both central and local government in our view must continue to work well together to ensure that happens.

We now must look to work even better with our colleagues in Citizens Advice, with councils and with those representing our key business and consumer interests to test the Secretary of State’s proposals, use the planned consultation exercise, and ensure what emerges works.