The British Food Journal Volume 58 Issue 6 1956

Abstract

In his paper presented at last month's annual conference of the Institute of Weights and Measures Administration Mr. J. D. Derbyshire, B.Sc. (Econ.), makes some far‐reaching suggestions for improving the machinery now in use to protect the purchasing public. Under the title “Caveat Venditor” he discusses the present position and outlines possible lines of development for the future. He defines “consumer protection” as “that area of service which aims at guaranteeing the consumer certain recognised or defined standards of quantity or quality in his commercial transactions which he may then use as a basis on which to exercise his personal preferences as a consumer. The machinery which affords this protection is at present variegated in the extreme: some of it national, some of it local, some of it public, some of it private; a confused collection of agencies, as yet showing few signs of co‐ordination and order. Included in this broad category will be found, in addition to the weights and measures service, the sampling and analytical service; the former safeguarding standards of quantity, the latter standards of quality. Within the sampling and analytical service will be found the public analysts, the food and drugs sampling officers, the fertilisers and feeding stuffs inspectors and samplers, and that other, as yet small but growing, band of men and women which, privately or with public backing, seeks to protect and raise quality standards of merchandise at present lying beyond the reach of specific legislative control.”