Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the current level of resources for local trading standards services based within local authorities in Great Britain.

Local authorities are independent of central government and are responsible for managing their own services and financial positions.

The final Local Government Finance Settlement for 2025-26 makes available over £69 billion for local government, which is a 6.8% cash terms increase in councils’ Core Spending Power on 2024-25. The majority of the Local Government Finance Settlement is unringfenced recognising that local leaders are best placed to identify local priorities, including for local trading standards services.