Examination of Witnesses (Questions 180
- 199)
WEDNESDAY 3 MARCH 1999
MR PAUL
LINCOLN, PROFESSOR
ANDREW TANNAHILL
and DR JOHN
KEMM
Rev Smyth
180. We have already discovered there is
some ambiguity in the whole situation. I would suspect, for example,
that potato skins might have more nutritional value than turkey
skin. It has come out twice that there has been no corporate decision.
Should this not have been an area which the health promotion bodies
should have been actively looking at and considering? I am wondering
whether the Food Standards Agency should be given targets and
how robust should targets should be. Have you any thoughts on
that matter?
(Professor Tannahill) In Scotland we have a set
of nutrition targets set out in the Diet Action Plan for Scotland,
so there are targets in place and there is a strategy that has
been set out that can have action across a broad front. The Food
Standards Agency can certainly play a very important part with
other partners in that strategy. As regards targets for its work,
I would certainly be interested in the Agency considering process
targets for its business in the early stages, to consider what
sort of pieces of advice it might be giving over its initial period,
what sort of working relationships it should be establishing with
the other players in the field. I think that we have outcome targets
in place for food. The Food Standards Agency can play a part in
achieving these, but, more importantly, we need to be looking
specifically at what the Food Standards Agency's business targets
might reasonably be expected to be in the first instance.
181. Would you like to illustrate that?
What sort of process are you thinking of might need a target?
(Professor Tannahill) I could only speak broad-brush
having been posed the question in this way, but looking at what
the Agency would like to achieve in terms of the giving of advice
in the areas of food safety, food standards and nutrition and
looking at the other players in the field and identifying mechanisms
for good communication and collaboration and perhaps targets within
that for identified pieces of joint work. I do not feel I can
be more specific than that at present.
Dr Brand
182. I would love to go back to the turkey
burgers. I agree with Dr Kemm that people should have information
to be able to exercise choice. Clearly a requirement could be
put on the label saying that they are turkey skins or they contain
so much fat. That in itself would not be terribly helpful unless
the result there was some communication as to whether that was
a healthy thing to do or it was not. Are we suggesting that the
manufacturers or the labellers get advice from two different agencies,
one through Food Standards saying that this has so much fat and
comes from turkey skins and another one from an organisation such
as yourselves saying that this is also for your heart and that
is not? Do you really believe that this draft Bill before us will
help the sort of joined-up thinking that we all think we ought
to have?
(Dr Kemm) I think there are two aspects of the
problem. One is clearly the labelling of the food which is a question
for legislation and for the manufacturers. The second is the informed
public which is clearly the responsibility of the Agency and of
agencies such as ours.
183. Sorry, whose main responsibility is
it? I really want to know who is the head honcho in these matters
because at the moment we seem to have a proliferation of agencies
all saying wonderful things. On the whole they say the same things
but occasionally they give varying advice and then the whole edifice
just collapses.
(Dr Kemm) I think the final deliverer is usually
going to be one of the health promotion agencies or something
else, but at the same time I think the Food Safety Agency has
got a very important task to do in ensuring that we are all singing
from the same hymn sheet.
184. Sorry, you have just used the term
Food Safety Agency instead of Food Standards Agency and this is
really the nub of the whole debate, whether we are dealing with
food safety and it may well be that if you are talking about the
safety of your turkey burger having a high concentration of fat
and a high concentration of salt that may make it a safer food
from a bacteriological point of view because it will go off less
quickly, but it certainly will not be more healthy for you. Clearly
someone has got to take responsibility for that. I am not clear,
either from reading the draft Bill or its surroundings or the
evidence we have heard, as to who will be responsible for this.
(Dr Kemm) I apologise for my freudian slip.
185. It is a very telling one.
(Mr Lincoln) I think it is important to understand
the roles and responsibilities of the Health Education and Health
Promotion Agencies. They take their advice from expert committees,
such as the Committee on the Medical Aspects of Food which has
a responsibility for nutrition policy and it suggests this is
a joint responsibility in the future between the FSA and the Department
of Health in terms of the secretariat to that group. So the nutrition
policy goals are proposed there and the Department of Health advised
accordingly.
186. But you are making the assumption that
the setting up of this Agency will not affect the role and the
statutory position of anything that currently exists such as yourself,
are you not?
(Mr Lincoln) Indeed, yes. That is a fair point.
Chairman
187. Could I ask Jill Wordley if she could
clarify these issues?
(Ms Wordley) Thank you, Chairman. I thought it
might be helpful to the Committee to clarify the position on labelling
because the first important point to make is that labelling is
subject to the EU Labelling Directive and, therefore, it is a
matter for EU competence. The lead responsibility on labelling
matters does lie at the moment with MAFF and will lie with the
Agency in future. Clearly in developing policy on labelling it
will need to take advice from others with expertise who it feels
it needs to consult, including in the field of nutrition labelling
which is part of the overall labelling picture. The labelling
responsibility lies principally with the Agency. There is then
an issue at the next stage in relation to consumer understanding
of labelling requirements where there is clearly a role for the
health promotion bodies and, indeed, there has been collaboration
in the past between MAFF and the HEO over the production of literature
and so on on helping consumers to understand the requirements
of labelling. I would just like to go back to a point that Ms
Keeble made about prosecutions which is just to mention that there
is an existing power in the Food Safety Act for Ministers to take
over the conduct of particular prosecutions where they are particularly
big or complex prosecutions, for instance. Those powers are transferred
under the Bill to the Secretary of State for Health and there
is a power there for the Agency to be directed to take that function,
so there is provision in the Bill which covers that points.
Ms Keeble
188. Under the powers and the transfer of
powers will the Food Standards Agency be able to streamline the
methods needed to bring prosecutions, which I understand is particularly
difficult when it comes to analysis of content, for example?
(Mrs Wordley) That is certainly an area in which
the Agency could operate. Already, for instance, research is undertaken
on methods of analysis which then can be used by local enforcement
officers, so that is an area where in co-operation with local
authorities it might be able to help them to improve their procedures.
Dr Ladyman
189. This might be something that it is
not for these witnesses to answer but perhaps they can help. I
think what I have heard is that the Food Standards Agency is going
to be responsible for the labelling of food, the health promotion
agencies are going to have a responsibility for making sure the
public are educated to be able to choose food wisely, based on
the labelling of the information that the Food Standards Agency
has made sure people have got. Am I right in saying that we do
not perceive within the Bill at the moment a power for the Food
Standards Agency to say to manufacturers of food that the processes
they are using are not optimal to ensure public health? In other
words, if somebody is processing vegetables in such a way that
all the vitamins are removed, at the moment all we are going to
do is make sure there is a vegetable on the shelf that does not
record the presence of any vitamins, we are not actually going
to say to the manufacturers, "Do it a different way, boil
it for less time and the vitamins will still be in there"?
(Professor Tannahill) As I understand it, the
Food Standards Agency will be able to give advice not just to
ministers but to the public and to other parties, and it is expected
to develop relationships and consult with the food industry and
so on. As I understand it, these communication opportunities and
requirements are set within the context of the whole food chain
at any stage, so my non-expert reading of this aspect of the Bill
would be that the Food Standards Agency would indeed be able to
advise industry if it considered that practices in the food chain
were not optimal.
190. But it would only be advice? Clearly
if a manufacturer is using a process which produces unsafe food,
it would actually be able to order them to change the process,
but if they are just producing food which is no better for you
than eating blotting paper it would only be able to advise them
to stop doing it. Is that fair?
(Mr Lincoln) I think the point is probably well
drawn out in the issue of fortification in terms of vitamins and
minerals where the issue is raised. I referred earlier to a situation
in New Zealand, and I think I am correct in saying that when a
similar authority was set up in New Zealand it was arguing for
the addition of vitamins and minerals to certain food substances
which was then contested by various interests at a later stage
because of the interpretation of overstepping its defined, narrow,
safety-orientated role in health protection. Because there was
not a health promoting dimension to its health protection role—the
Agency was constrained for safety factors considerations. So I
think that is a very good example.
(Dr Kemm) I recognise the problem that you are
raising and it is an important one. I think clearly advice is
one line, the next line is that it has the power to offer that
advice publicly, and I can see in an extreme case that might be
a very useful line. How far you would want to get to the point
where it was running the processing factory is I think a difficult
area. Could I slightly expand that because, as I said, I see the
important principle throughout the whole thing as being informed
choice. We have talked about the information a lot but there is
also the choice aspect and you have raised the situation in which
it may well be that choice is not being provided, and my bet is
that when this product is produced you will find it in the corner
shops where the less wealthy shop and when you go to one of the
plusher supermarkets you will find that product is not stocked
there. So I would hope that not only is it giving advice but it
is also keeping a very important eye on the policy aspects to
make sure the sort of problem which I have just raised is controlled.
Rev Smyth
191. Going back to targets, since we are
talking about co-operation and partnership, are there any targets
from your own understanding and from what you have been doing
that you believe the Food Standards Agency should take over?
(Professor Tannahill) The existing targets in
the Scottish context are targets to be achieved through a concerted
effort of a great many agencies and the Food Standards Agency
will be an important player. But one crucial issue here is to
recognise the very important multi-agency aspect of public health
efforts.
192. I understand your answer but I specifically
asked are there any targets in your own field that you have already
set that the Food Standards Agency should be looking at and taking
over?
(Professor Tannahill) If you mean taking over
in the sense of adopting and signing up to, then the Scottish
Diet Action Plan targets would be ones which the Food Standards
Agency could look at early in its existence, and I would suggest
would wish to set out how exactly within its remit it could make
a very important contribution to these targets.
(Mr Lincoln) We would like to see targets in relation
to consumer friendly food labelling which are ubiquitously applied,
and also the confidence the public has in the work of the Agency
in terms of food safety and food standards. A proper measure of
that which agencies like ourselves look at as well as the credibility
we have with the public as a messenger is extremely important.
(Dr Kemm) In terms of taking over targets, there
are also Welsh indicators that relate to food, but certainly I
would hope that the Food Standards Agency would sign up to them
and endorse them so in that sense certainly take them over. In
the sense of being grounds for disciplining the chief executive
if they are not achieved, I would have preferred those targets
to be process out targets rather than the more distant targets
that we have been discussing.
Mr Jones
193. Dr Kemm, does your organisation think
that the proposed relationship between the Food Standards Agency
and the Welsh Assembly is going to further the cause of health
promotion within Wales? Do you think it is the correct balance?
(Dr Kemm) There has obviously been a lot of discussion
on that issue but clearly the Welsh Assembly is not with us yet
and when it comes it will doubtless wish to decide for itself
precisely how it relates to it. We have not foreseen a difficulty
but would it be appropriate for my colleague from the Welsh Office
to give you a fuller answer?
194. Of course.
(Dr Blamire) The National Assembly through its
Health Improvement Directorate will have the role of liaison with
the Food Standards Agency. The Assembly will be the sponsor in
terms of grant-in-aid. We envisage with the other devolved authorities
that we will play a part in defining the work programme in the
UK Agency, but most definitely the Assembly will concern itself
with the Agency's activities in and for Wales and there will be
a relationship through concordats and other agreements to ensure
that. Not all members of the Committee will be aware that the
Assembly is taking on the Health Promotion Agency for Wales, it
will be part of the Assembly from its inception, so the special
health authority which the Agency currently is will be abolished
on 31st March and the functions and staff of the Health Promotion
Agency will transfer into the Assembly. So it will be a body corporate
and there will be a national health promotion and health improvement
strategy for Wales and both the elements that will be within the
Food Standards Agency and other aspects, such as the communicable
disease strategy for Wales, will be brought together within the
Assembly. So I think it will be enormously beneficial to have
the Agency on the ground in Wales able to relate to the industry
and to local government which is, as you will know, very closely
involved with the National Assembly and will be through the Partnership
Council in the future. We have not tested these arrangements yet
but the planning should make it collaborative and establish close
working relationships.
195. So fingers crossed that the specific
health needs of Wales, which are different, as Scotland has different
needs, will be met because of those arrangements which have been
made. That is how you see it at the moment?
(Dr Blamire) Yes. The Green Paper for Wales, Better
Health Better Wales takes a very broad view of health improvement
in Wales and includes a Food Standards Agency in that planning.
Mr Paterson
196. I have seen figures that 80 to 85 per
cent of food poisoning cases occur because of poor storage of
food and poor preparation of food in private homes. As this is
much the largest cause of food poisoning, how do you think the
Food Standards Agency will improve public health?
(Dr Kemm) Clearly when there is a food poisoning
event there has been a whole chain leading up to the consumption
of that food and correct action at any point along that chain
could probably have averted the event. At the producer end of
the chain, that is clearly going to be very much the responsibility
of the Agency. At the other end, where all sorts of infections
take place due to bad practice in domestic kitchens, clearly that
is an educational role where the health promotion agencies will
have a major part to play in getting those messages across.
197. We are creating this very large organisation
at considerable public expense and trouble and we are addressing
possibly 15 to 20 per cent of the problem, surely the biggest
problem is what is going on in the home, which is the sort of
area that your organisations could be actively involved in possibly
at much less public expense and far more public benefit?
(Professor Tannahill) The Food Standards Agency
will be able to be of great assistance in stimulating action in
this area across a broad front at all points at which it can make
a difference, and in advising us, the Health Education Board for
Scotland, on incorporating work as we have been doing on handling
food with considerations of microbiological dangers. One of the
great benefits I can foresee in the Food Standards Agency, not
least in its early days, is to stimulate a whole public climate
of thought and where appropriate concern about what we eat and
how we prepare food and how food is processed and so on across
all of its remits. Within that, I would see as an early priority
for the Food Standards Agency being to encourage the deployment
of the mechanisms at its disposal to reduce the risk of microbiological
problems and to stimulate public interest in this area, public
awareness, and encourage the public to recognise that there is
much that they can do. But that would be something which is being
done within the broader context of also trying to safeguard the
public against the matters which are outwith their direct control.
Dr Moonie
198. Very briefly just to follow up on that
question to Dr Kemm, in the field of health promotion what impact
do you think the FSA will have on your future role, Professor
Tannahill?
(Professor Tannahill) Our position within the
Health Education Board for Scotland is that we would wish to continue
to be the lead body for education for healthy eating in Scotland.
The reasons I touched on earlier include the fact that we have
the infrastructures through our programmes, reaching the general
public through mass media, schools, communities, the work-place
and so on; we have the infrastructures in place to incorporate
healthy eating messages and healthy eating encouragement and skills
development through our programmes. We also are able crucially
to integrate the education and broader health promotion measures
on food with some wider public health issues. We therefore see
that the Food Standards Agency can help us in two ways. One, by
tackling aspects of protection of the public health which are
not within the remit of the Health Education Board for Scotland
and, two, by helping to inform our work, so we can take authoritative
information and we are the body who have national responsibility
in Scotland for assimilating that information into health education
messages and wider health promotion approaches.
199. A slightly leading question to get
to the point of what I am trying to find out, do you see their
role then as setting objective standards and your role as implementing
them?
(Professor Tannahill) I would put it slightly
differently from that. Their role, insofar as we are talking about
health education messages, is to help us by providing a reliable
scientific basis on which to proceed. I think that if you were
to say that they set out objectives and we implement them, that
perhaps runs the risk of assuming that the Agency would frame
the health education message and we would simply deliver it. An
important part of the specialist role of a national health education
and health promotion body is actually to devise messages based
on scientific information. There is expertise required in that
area because scientific information needs to be processed, as
it were, in a way that is understandable, accessible and co-ordinated
with wider health promotion efforts.
(Mr Lincoln) We would see the role of the Agency
as clearly from the expert point of view defining a healthy diet,
helping to set the priorities, to provide a supportive environment
to the work the HEA would take forward. We would see ourselves
working in a public partnership arrangement with the FSA and other
key players in this area. We have the machinery in place for the
implementation of the health promotion programmes which there
is quite a science to, it is not just a matter of producing leaflets
and posters, it is about proper assessment of need, targeting
of groups, being clear about messages which are acceptable, dealing
with myths about food, pre-testing communication, getting the
right effect via media channels, ensuring an alliance is built
with workers at national and local level to support that, and
very much the FSA provides the backdrop and supportive environment
to that.
|
