The way Britain produces, manufactures,
sells and consumes food is a barrier to healthy eating, hitting
the poorest hardest, a group of Peers has
said.
And current Government policies, or lack of
them, condemn many children to a life of ill health, cost the NHS
billions, and damage the
environment according to the House of
Lords Food, Poverty, Health and Environment
Committee.
In a wide-ranging
report, Hungry for change: fixing the
failures in food, published today (6 July) the
committee says that the Government’s recommended healthy diet is
too expensive for many
families.
Without enough time, knowledge and money to
shop for healthier food, the poorest are most at risk from a
system which actively encourages highly processed, less healthy
food by making it cheaper, more heavily promoted and easier to
buy.
Urgent action
is needed to ensure a healthier
population, a healthier environment, to level up the most
deprived communities and save the NHS billions spent treating
obesity and avoidable diet-related
diseases.
People in Britain consume more highly processed
food than those in any other European country, and Britain has
one of the highest obesity rates in Europe. Adults
and children living in the most deprived
areas are about twice as likely to
be obese than those living in the least deprived areas,
contributing to a difference in healthy life expectancy of about
20 years between the richest and poorest people in the
country.
COVID-19 has made an already dreadful situation
worse and should be a “wake-up call” for urgent action, according
to the committee. Before the coronavirus pandemic too many people
did not have enough money to feed themselves or their families
properly, relying on food banks to survive. In the past
few monthsthe use of food banks has shot
up by a reported 81 per cent.
, chair of the committee,
said:
“Problems of diet and ill-health have
been staring us in the face for decades, but successive
Governments have done precious little about it. While this
affects everyone, people in poverty either can’t afford enough to
eat or have unhealthy diets.
“Many of Britain’s poorest families have little or no
choice. They either go without food or buy unhealthy food because
that’s what they can afford and get hold
of.
“The Government knows about the problem.
It’s time to stop the dither and delay, endless talking and
consultation, and get on with
it.”
Anna Taylor, Executive Director of the Food
Foundation,
said:
“This landmark report clearly explains the raft
of actions needed to tackle our nation’s dietary inequalities
which have been highlighted so starkly by the Covid
pandemic.
“This report shows that millions of families
can’t eat well unless they have sufficient income and an
environment which makes the healthy choice the easiest. People
can no longer wait for lengthy government consultations which
languish in Whitehall.
“Every day that passes where the odds are
stacked against families securing a healthy diet is a
missed opportunity to secure a healthy future for our
children.”
One in five people in Britain live in
poverty and this country has one of the highest rates of food
insecurity in the European Union, accounting for 20 per cent of
all severely food insecure people in
Europe.
Agriculture is “environmentally unsustainable”
too, according to the committee. If Britain is to meet its net
zero emissions target to combat climate change, farmers must be
supported fully and rewarded for environmental
outcomes.
The committee wants the Government without
delay to:
-
Start to measure how many people live
with food insecurity, and
analyse why;
-
Understand the cost of a healthy diet
and incorporate this into
benefits calculations;
-
Act to curb excessive advertising
and promotion of unhealthy foods by the
food industry;
-
Step up pressure on the food industry
to reduce sugar, salt, unhealthy fats and calories in processed
food, and introduce mandatory requirements where change has
not happened;
-
Ensure that food initiatives for
disadvantaged children, such as Healthy Start and free school
meals are properly funded, implemented
and monitored;
-
Establish an independent body to
oversee the implementation of a National Food Strategy and
report annually to Parliament
on progress;
-
Use the opportunity of the Agriculture Bill to
encourage production and consumption of healthier food and
ensure that it delivers the public environmental goods it is
designed to.
