Bailiffs should be officially regulated and required to wear body cameras to monitor their behaviour when they seize property to cover unpaid bills and fines, MPs have recommended.

In a highly critical report on the debt recovery industry, the justice select committee has urged the government to provide better protection for vulnerable families. An inquiry heard evidence of enforcement companies insisting on home visits in order to drive up their fees and failing to deal with high levels of complaints.

The existing system of certification of enforcement agents by the courts is a “rubber-stamping exercise”, the MPs said. The committee also heard local authorities were passing more debts on to bailiffs than before and that “aggressive behaviour” was still occurring despite legal reforms.

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Joanna Elson of the Money Advice Trust charity told MPs that despite some improvements, charities regularly saw regulations being contravened, especially where “bailiffs will not accept affordable repayment offers [and] seize goods inappropriately [or] they fail to take vulnerable circumstances into account”.

The report said: “Citizens Advice, for example, claimed that 2.2 million people had been personally contacted by bailiffs in the last two years and that 39% of these – or 850,000 people – were seeing bailiffs break the rules.”

Problems included bailiffs telling people they could break into houses when they did not have the right to do so, or threatening to take control of exempt goods such as essential household items.

The debt charity StepChange reported that a quarter of people who were visited by bailiffs tried to arrange repayment over the phone but found they insisted on visiting their home to take payment – “thus triggering the next stage of payment and increasing the debt by £235”.

“We recommend that there should be an independent complaints body, to which all complaints about bailiffs should be escalated if the complainant has exhausted local complaints procedures,” the MPs concluded. “The complaints process should be very clearly set out, and have as few levels as possible so that it is easy to navigate.

“We are surprised that bailiffs are apparently so under-regulated compared with other sectors, especially given that they deal with some of the most vulnerable people in society. It does not make sense for enforcement to be regulated only through the rubber-stamping of individuals through a court certification process.”

The MPs recommended making body-worn cameras mandatory for all enforcement agents visiting homes and businesses. “This would protect both the agent and debtor and help make it easier to investigate complaints,” the report said.

The chair of the justice select committee, Bob Neill, said: “We held our inquiry to investigate the complaints about bailiffs recorded by debt advice charities … The system is confusing, particularly for the most vulnerable people in society. Complaints are important and must be investigated properly.

“We were surprised that no regulator is already in place. We’re calling on the government to consult on whether new powers should sit with an existing body or a new one, and how it should be funded.”

Gillian Guy, the chief executive of Citizens Advice, said: “Bailiffs regularly break the rules, as our evidence has proved. In the past year we’ve seen a 16% increase in bailiff-related issues. All eyes will now be on the Ministry of Justice, which must introduce these reforms as a matter of urgency.”

Richard Burgon MP, Labour’s shadow justice secretary, supported the call for a regulator to oversee the bailiff industry, saying: “People in vulnerable situations clearly need better protection from aggressive bailiffs whose unscrupulous behaviour far too often causes significant stress and anxiety.

“The Tories should act on this report and commit to an independent regulator to crackdown on rogue bailiffs who are often pushing the law to its limits - or even going beyond it.”