How consumer protection laws are failing to safeguard us

Iain Ramsay and Ian Arnott respond to George Monbiot’s article on cuts to trading standards and the lack of law enforcement

George Monbiot is right to draw attention to the absence of enforcement of consumer protection law, and people running into “a wall of unaccountable, opaque bureaucracy” when they attempt to report scams (My friend was the victim of a scam – and cuts mean she can do nothing about it, 12 May). I encountered the same problem when trying to contact trading standards in relation to a national retailer in Canterbury that was continuing to run a “closing down” sale for many months – in my opinion, a breach of relevant consumer protection regulations. I was unable to contact trading standards directly, and could only identify relevant officials by making a freedom of information request to the council for the trading standards annual report.

The government has claimed that leaving the European Union will not affect standards of consumer protection in the UK, but even if this claim is correct, laws are of little use if they are not properly enforced.
Iain Ramsay
Emeritus professor of law, Kent Law School, University of Kent

George Monbiot could also have included, as another example of the loss of law enforcement, the more or less wholesale closures nationwide of local HMRC tax offices, which are being replaced with regional hubs in large cities. The consequence is, of course, that with the loss of local knowledge and eyes and ears on the ground, the opportunities for tax fraud have been considerably enabled. Whether this is a deliberate policy choice by the government is difficult to say, but it does seem that it will be complicit in the resulting loss of revenue.
Ian Arnott
Peterborough

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