Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he is taking to increase the number of Trading Standards Officers in England and Wales.

Trading Standards Officers are employed by local authorities which are independent from central government. These authorities are responsible for determining their spending priorities and for the recruitment of Trading Standards Officers; they are accountable to their local electorate.

The Department provides funding to National Trading Standards (NTS) to enable local authorities in England and Wales to take coordinated action on consumer harm issues that cross local authority boundaries.