Recommendation 20

The OPSS is still quite a new regulator with only a £14 million budget for product safety operations. The Department told us that it is providing additional funding for goods checking at the border, while the OPSS noted that additional resources and tools would be needed to effectively regulate the scale of products now sold online.36 The OPSS also stressed the importance of having adequate competences to regulate product safety into the future, particularly in areas such as science, engineering and emerging technologies. It pointed to recent work it has undertaken to build its capabilities in these areas, including recently appointing a scientific advisory group and working with academic institutions.37