Examination of Witnesses (Questions 428
- 439)
TUESDAY 9 MARCH 1999
MS SHEILA
MCKECHNIE,
MS JULIE
SHEPPARD, MS
HAZEL PHILLIPS
and MS JILL
JOHNSTONE
Chairman
428. Could I welcome you all to this morning's
evidence taking session? I wonder if I could ask you to briefly
introduce yourselves for the record?
(Ms Sheppard) I am Julie Sheppard. I am a Senior
Public Affairs Officer at the Consumers' Association.
(Ms McKechnie) Sheila McKechnie, Director of the
Consumers' Association.
(Ms Phillips) Hazel Phillips, Senior Parliamentary
Officer of the National Consumer Council.
(Ms Johnstone) Jill Johnstone, Head of Policy
at the National Consumer Council.
429. You are probably well aware that we
are taking evidence on the draft legislation as opposed to some
of the issues in and around food safety and standards. Nevertheless,
we have decided as a Committee to look at wider issues in relation
not just to the question of the words on paper in front of us
that would be looked at perhaps in a committee room like this
at a later stage. I wonder if I could ask you, just as a general
opener, if you believe that the Food Standards Agency as it is
drafted at the moment in this form is likely to re-establish the
confidence that the public should have in our food chain in the
United Kingdom?
(Ms McKechnie) If life was that simple, would
it not be wonderful? I think the Food Standards Agency is the
first step towards restoring confidence. One of your difficulties
in looking at the broad frame of the legislation is that, while
it certainly is acceptable to us in its thrust and its approach,
it is making this thing work effectively. That will have a great
deal to do with the people appointed to run it and the disinterested
nature of the appointments to the board, the confidence that the
public has in the chairman, the confidence that the public has
in the chief executive. In our written evidence, I think we have
made some suggestions as to how that should be carried through.
We do have some reservations on the legislation which will come
out in terms of the questions and answers but this is the first
step. It is a real, fundamental breach with the old system. It
takes it out of the industry set-up where it was certainly mistrusted
by consumers and I think keeping nutrition in and not conceding
to the pressure from the industry on that point was a major step
forward in the government showing that it was putting consumers
at the heart of this legislation. I think there is a long way
to go and I have to say to you that I think the confidence is
not just lost in the food industry. Confidence has been lost in
the regulation by government and that is what you are responsible
for. That is what you are trying to restore. This is a good first
step.
(Ms Phillips) The National Consumer Council very
much welcomes this draft legislation. It is something we have
been calling for for ten years now. The key issue for us is to
make sure it is independent and it is perceived to be independent;
that it operates openly and also that the roles of all the various
committees and bits of different government departments that will
work with it are very clear, to make sure that it works effectively.
Some of the issues that we are particularly concerned about that
we raised in our evidence, are to do with the role of the Agency
on the farm, its openness and the powers of the Secretary of State
in relation to the legislation.
Rev Smyth
430. I am trying to figure out this complete
lack of confidence in our food production because most of us look
fairly healthy. The aspect I would like to test you on is this:
do you believe that the emphasis upon food safety and its protection
may have diluted the role of the Food Standards Agency in dealing
with nutrition, bearing in mind that we had evidence last week
that deaths by food poisoning number about 100; deaths by lack
of proper nutrition, coupled with other aspects, run into thousands.
Is it really lack of confidence in the food industry that is the
problem at the moment in the nation or is it lack of guidance
that would help them as well to have proper balanced diets?
(Ms McKechnie) There are about three different
questions in there, if you do not mind me saying so. On the issue
of nutrition and safety, that is a distinction which, if you follow
through some of the scientific arguments, is not as sound in practice
as it looks on paper. I am sure Philip James in his evidence—which
I have not read and I have not heard but I know his views—would
have gone into it in some detail, so I do not feel I need to go
into that. The reason the issue of nutrition was so important
was the food producing industry's and processing industry's fear
that we would get into issues such as compositional standards
and, more importantly I think, the issue of labelling. If you
say consumers ought to be able to choose and if they are given
choice and clear information they will have confidence in their
own judgments, yes, there is some truth in that. We are a long
way from giving people honest information. I can illustrate that.
These are my two favourite props. They sit in my room and every
visitor says why am I eating tinned mince and baby bananas. This
is from a major manufacturer. Do not let us name it because I
could have chosen any one of six. This is targeted at parents
with young children and it is targeted as a healthy food. Your
responsible parent trying to choose a reasonable, balanced diet
for the child would be attracted to this kind of package. It is
glamorous a little but it is also scientific. What is in it? There
is more sugar in this than there is banana. By any nutritional
standard, this is not what you would be wanting to feed your baby
with if you were worried in the first instance about their teeth.
This one is Tyne Mince and Onions. I have a slight problem here
because mince in Scotland means lamb and it tends to mean beef
in England so, depending on which side of the border you come
from, you might think you are buying something different. Irrespective
of what side of the border you come from, the major constituent
of this can is water and the second major is mechanically recovered
chicken. If you do not know what mechanically recovered chicken
is——
Mrs Organ
431. Unfortunately, those of us from the
Agriculture Select Committee do.
(Ms McKechnie) I will shut up. Asking consumers
to make informed choices on their purchasing decisions when consumers
are targeting labelling—the supermarkets are very well aware
that consumers want to choose healthy diets. Some will not and
will say, "I am going to walk under a bus so why worry about
what I eat?" Others will take a rather more responsible view,
particularly when they are trying to improve the quality of the
diet of their children. They cannot, on the basis of the existing
labelling system, make that choice. If people really knew what
they were buying in some of those things that say "Light
this" and "Farm fresh that" and "Healthy eating
this", and the criticism we have had at the supermarkets
is that they have responded to this consumer desire for good quality
information by launching what are essentially marketing schemes
that are misleading. One of the real roles of the Agency is to
make consumer choice in the food field a meaningful choice. If
you are anything like me, 75 per cent of what I put in my mouth
in the course of an average day is not under my control. Therefore,
to leave it all to individual choice seems to me to misunderstand
the nature of how we actually put our diet together.
Rev Smyth
432. I understand the problem of retailers
is they even go for green labelling and go for what is the in
thing. I do not want to go on to specific labelling but you did
touch on the fact of nutritional values. That would suggest to
me that you were interested in that as a role for the Food Standards
Agency. What would be the most effective means by which the Agency
will impart to the public what was set forth in the consultation
document, really intelligible, scientifically based information
about the nutritional content of individual foods and impartial
and accurate advice on a balanced diet? It did seem to me that
you were coming on to that. Have you thought that through?
(Ms McKechnie) Yes. We have learned an awful lot
in recent years. Maybe the NCC would like to comment on that aspect
because they have done quite a lot on consumer education, as we
have in the broader sense. There are things that have to be done
at the level of schools, the point of sale information, where
people can access information, the role of the new healthy living
centres, the role of local authorities, etc. There is a whole
machine out there to do with trying to get information over to
people in a way that they can comprehend, understand and use to
inform their decisions. We have learned quite a lot about what
works and what does not work in that field. The Agency should
approach it from that view. We are not starting from scratch.
We know what health messages get through, what style works and
what is appropriate for different audiences. I think it is important
to understand that the key role of the Agency is not necessarily
to do all of this because there are whole bits of the education
machine that are functioning in other areas. They have to make
sure that those public bodies with a role in that field adopt
a consistent approach and accept their advice in terms of the
way forward. What is the important role, going back and linking
it with your last question, is that when there is a whole public
controversy—let us take for argument the kind of scientific
research where somebody—and scientists do this; they put
a report out saying, "This is a great hazard" and you
get the report in the paper the next day saying, "Blah, blah,
blah", and this is a serious problem. Often the report does
not distinguish between absolute and relative risk and people
get the wrong end of the stick. At that point something called
the Food Standards Agency makes an authoritative statement saying,
"Our view is this, this, this. We are going to do this, this,
this. In the meantime our advice to consumers is this, this, this."
If that seems simple try and apply it to any of the major issues
of public concern of health in recent years—pthalates in
baby milk, PCBs in breast milk. There is no point at which when
something like that is reported in the press there is a single
voice saying this is the middle, sensible way forward. And it
is the link between the broad thrust of making people give sensible
general information and the need to give authoritative single
issue information fast when the need arises that I think is critical
to the role of the Agency.
433. The requirement is censorship then
because the press are likely to go for the startling and unlikely
to go for the balanced.
(Ms McKechnie) I am not that cynical!
Chairman
434. Can I ask for the National Consumer
Council's response.
(Ms Johnstone) Yes, if I could just add to that.
Consumer education is a huge subject and we could be here all
day. I fundamentally agree with Sheila that in a sense the Agency's
role is to see that it happens rather than necessarily to do it
all itself. It cannot do it all itself. We need to get consumer
education back into the national curriculum. We need to get it
into adult education and learning programmes. We need to improve
labelling and improve the information leaflets that are available
at food outlets and so on. The most important thing the Agency
can do is make sure that all these things are happening and happening
in a consistent way. As Sheila says, when there is an issue out
there that could have been reported in various ways in the media,
it can come out and make clear statements about what it thinks
and what it is going to do.
(Ms Sheppard) I think you are right that probably
the media will seize on a particular aspect of some report and
that is what we get the headlines on and the next thing you know
you are in a full scale food scare. One of the things we really
hope about the Agency because it is going to operate more openly
and it is not going to always default to secrecy is that it is
going to be less prevalent because it is secrecy and non-disclosure
that tends to fuel food scares almost more than anything else.
Dr Brand
435. Do you think the draft legislation
is specific enough or enabling enough to make sure there is that
clarity to get that message across because clearly this is a new
Agency, it is taking on this responsibility according to Mrs Jowell,
it is not taking it on really according to Mr Rooker, who sees
it mainly as a hiving off of current activity from MAFF into something
very similar but in a different building with a different culture
and different accountability structure, a much more limited form.
At the same time we have organisations such as the Health Education
Authority, the Royal Colleges, the Chief Medical Officer and individual
Ministers all pronouncing on food matters. Do you think this legislation
is comprehensive enough to actually give us a simpler structure?
(Ms McKechnie) I think there have been a number
of areas where there has been fudging. That is not helpful and
I think we have all concentrated very much on what MAFF is up
to in respect to this legislation and they have been trying, obviously,
to retain as many powers as possible and as big a bit of the budget
and it is public knowledge around Whitehall that there is a Civil
Service turf war going on which I suggest you explore with the
people that can answer the question. I simply know it is going
on. What people have not noticed or concentrated on to the same
degree is that the Department of Health and its staff are up to
exactly the same thing. So if I had to pinpoint the areas where
it has been fudged, one is veterinary medicines and pesticides,
because I see no logical reason why those committees should not
have come under the new structure and that was a very clear responsibility.
At the other side on health, for some reason and given that public
health has had such a diminished role within the Department of
Health in the last two decades, they wanted to keep control of
COMAX, the Committee on the Medical Aspects of Food and some compromise
is reached where there is a shared secretariat. Again that seems
to me to be completely illogical. There is no reason why COMAX
should not be simply part of the Agency. Again what is going on
there? We only see it from the outside and we pick up the gossip.
I think it would be very important for you to try and get to the
bottom of all of this. There are areas where people are trying
to hold on to future responsibility either for reasons of retaining
the money or the positions or the power within those areas. So
I accept the point that you have made in that respect. In respect
to what is the best way to draft regulations, one of the things
in terms of the review of parliamentary legislation and the whole
debate about the quality of it, is that it is much better to have
framework regulation which allows a degree of flexibility so that
you can change without having to come back and go through the
whole laborious primary legislation. I am less worried than most
or the CA is less worried than most about the incremental ways
in which the Agency will build on its framework. I am not particularly
concerned about Agency agreements, say with different inspectorates.
I think to ask an Agency to get off the ground, set its priorities,
completely restructure and reform its committees, all of those
things are going to need to be done as a matter of priority. To
then ask it to manage a whole series of inspectorates immediately
seems to me to be not a sensible managerial process—I am
sorry I have got my management hat on—and if I was doing
this I would want to shoot the ducks in the right order in terms
of making this thing work. So in that sense I am not so worried.
In boundaries I think there have been a lot of departmental attempts
to claw back from the original Philip James proposals the areas
that they regard as critical to their departmental interest but
you have to get to the bottom of that; I have no means of doing
so.
436. Can I offer an example before the National
Consumer Council answers the same question. My postbag is full
at the moment from people who buy things from health food shops
with the threat of having those substances labelled as medicines
rather than food. In all the advice coming from the Department
of Health there has not been a single mention of the Food Standards
Agency coming in. When I have explored this with other witnesses
they say that the grey areas as to whom this problem belongs to
will remain a grey area. There is not a mechanism for determining
whose primary responsibility it is to decide what is a food and
what is a medicine. Is that the sort of example we can use in
illustration?
(Ms Phillips) In terms of the generality of the
structure of the Agency I would want to follow on from Sheila's
point about the veterinary medicines side and the pesticides side.
We were very disappointed that was not going to be part of the
Agency's remit because we are very keen to see that the industry
promotion remit of the Ministry of Agriculture is quite separate
from the food regulation side. Obviously that is of major concern.
Also now that we are getting an idea of how it is going to operate
in practice it does seem there is going to be quite a number of
different bits of Ministry of Agriculture and Department of Health
working together particularly on the veterinary medicine side
and how they will work in with the Agency is going to be fairly
crucial in practice if this is the model that we go for. I think
we are very keen to ensure that on all the concordats—and
I know they are not part of the legislation as such but it is
the background in which we are operating—we will be consulted
about how all those arrangements will work because I think, in
practice, if a new emerging disease arises or some kinds of disaster
happens it is very important that every different government department
or committee or whatever all know what their various responsibilities
are and who is supposed to communicate with whom. In the BSE inquiry
we know, for example, that the Chief Medical Officer did not know
that the Ministry of Agriculture thought there was a health problem
with BSE for six months. We want to make sure that all lines of
communication are absolutely clear and people know what their
responsibilities are.
437. Do you think the legislation makes
it clear?
(Ms Phillips) The concordats are going to be crucial
in this. I do not know that you can necessarily legislate.
438. I thought it was a sort of aeroplane.
I do not think it is defined in the legislation what a concordat
is.
(Ms Phillips) Maybe that should be included in
the legislation so that the actual process can be——
(Ms Sheppard) What I would like to add about the
concordats is that these are going to be the administrative arrangements
that are going to determine the role that the Agency plays in
relation to these agencies primarily on farm responsibilities.
The Agency is not going to have day-to-day responsibility for
what happens before the farm gate. We are concerned about that.
But it is something that we could actually live with if we could
be sure that, firstly, the Agency would have a right of veto and
intervention where it could see public health was being compromised
by the failure of MAFF or those agencies to act. But, secondly,
we would like these gentlemen's agreements (which are basically
what the concordats are between the Agency and say the VMD and
the PSD) to be subject to public scrutiny. We would like them
to go out to public consultation. These should not be matters
for officials to decide behind closed doors.
(Ms McKechnie) It does not answer your point about
is a health food a food or a medicine. That is a huge debate.
We have been working on it and we think where people have been
taking food supplements as medicines then they ought to meet the
standards. The legislation at the moment in terms of claims is
extremely weak. You can do a certain amount through the Advertising
Standards Authority. If a supplement or something is claimed to
do something the ASA can write and say can you produce the evidence.
On the other hand, I am sympathetic to some genuine people in
that sector of the industry where they say ginseng has been drunk
for 2000 years, why do you want us to go through animal studies?
We have actually been using it on the human population.
439. I do not mean an answer to my question
to write back to my constituents. It was an illustration to really
test out your view whether you think what is being proposed at
the moment in the Food Standards Agency will make it more clear
as to what the line of accountability is for giving advice and
policy on this issue.
(Ms McKechnie) That is why I come back to this
point that a lot of these things will have to be resolved while
the Agency carves out its space. That is why I put a great emphasis
on the issue of culture. What is the culture of the Agency? By
culture I mean the way we do things round here, what are our priorities,
and that is why we think it is important that the Agency is clearly
separate from the government machine, that the chairman/chairperson
is appropriately independent and robust and, more than that, that
the chief executive should be appointed preferably from the outside.
I do not wish to discriminate between candidates that may come
from the Civil Service, but it should be clearly understood that
that person is an employee of the board and we do not want the
kind of exchanges that are very clear from the evidence that has
been submitted to the BSE inquiry where the way to nobble the
board and the chair is to control what happens between the civil
servants. These appointments are critical and getting a whole
different approach into this Agency means that you have to actually
go down a very different route than, say, if it was simply being
a bit of government shifted from one government department to
another government department. This is an exciting, incredible
opportunity to look at transparent, confidence-building institutions
in a very different relation to government than has previously
been the case and I think you need somebody that understands that
to get this Agency on a sound footing.
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