Millions of people are exposed to scams and dangerous products because of understaffed trading standards teams, a freedom of information (FOI) request has revealed.

Which? sent FOI requests to 187 trading standards services in England, Wales and Scotland and found a dramatic difference in staffing levels depending on the area.

The consumer watchdog discovered two councils had just one full-time officer, while three London boroughs only had one or two, amounting to less than one per 100,000 residents.

Enfield has the smallest team, with 0.43 staff per 100,000 people. By comparison, trading standards for Devon, Somerset, Plymouth and Torbay has 67 staff (3.7 per 100,000).

Lancashire County Council has 55.6 total staff and 4.44 per 100,000 people, while Orkney has the equivalent of almost 21 staff per 100,000.

Liverpool City Council has 5.5 staff in total (1.11 staff per 100,000 people) and Barnsley Borough Council has with 3.1 staff (1.26 staff per 100,000 people).

According to the Chartered Trading Standards Institute, spending on trading standards has been cut by 50% over the past decade and staffing levels have fallen by 30%-50%.

Two thirds of trading standards services that answered Which?’s question about allocating resources said that low staffing levels meant they could not investigate tip-offs at least some of the time.

Rocio Concha, Which? director of Policy and Advocacy, described trading standards as a ‘postcode lottery’ that was ‘no longer fit for purpose.’

Responding to the report, Heather Kidd, chair of the Local Government Association’s Safer and Stronger Communities Board, said budget constraints and an ageing workforce had impacted on councils’ enforcement abilities.

For more on this topic, check out The Trading Standards Crisis by John Herriman, chief executive at the Chartered Trading Standards Institute.