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Mr. O'Brien: The hon. Gentleman's point would have been valid had he been in the Chamber a little earlier, although I am sure that he was kept away purely by other commitments. The provision would apply only to major ingredients--ones that form 25 per cent. by weight of a food. I made that point previously and, if there is any deficiency with his learned skills in respect of interpreting the Bill, I should make it clear that that is certainly what is intended. However, I must say to him in all candour that I am not convinced that the Bill's drafting necessarily achieves that aim as there is a doubt: catering organisations may not be consumers in the normal sense of the word and restaurant meals may not be precisely food "presented for sale", which would therefore be labelled in the manner envisaged under the Bill. Again, I would welcome the House's assistance.

Clauses 5 and 6 deal with normal matters and I draw the House's attention to the fact that Mr. Alex Johnstone has introduced to the Scottish Parliament a Bill relating to meat labelling and country of origin. There may be difficulties in this example between England and Wales and Scotland following devolution--let alone between this country and the rest of Europe--but, timetabling and the approval of both Houses of Parliament permitting, the two measures could ride in tandem and ensure a level playing field.

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I shall move toward a finish. As I have taken a number of interventions, my speech has run on a little longer than I expected.

Angela Smith (Basildon): Will the hon. Gentleman take a further intervention?

Mr. O'Brien: Yes.

Angela Smith: We are approaching the end of our proceedings and I may have the opportunity to contribute so I should be grateful for the hon. Gentleman's comments on the drafting of the Bill. Clause 3 refers to when


I am not sure whether that wording would stand up in court. Has it appeared in any other legislation and does he have examples? Is he confident that it will work?

Mr. O'Brien: I am not aware that those particular words have been lifted from existing legislation and it would be a legitimate matter for the Committee to consider. I believe that they were the most felicitous words that I and others could devise to ensure that we give effect to the Bill's principles and clause 3 in particular.

The Government are clearly aware of the great concern among consumers. Their spokesman in the other place, Baroness Hayman, recently launched a consultation on food labelling that happens to coincide with the debate on the Bill. She has said that she believes that consumers have a right to clear, informative labels to help them make "informed choices" about foods.

It is clear what consumers want, so why wait? The Government should use the opportunity of the Bill to deliver what consumers and producers are crying out for on food labelling. I do not believe that it is necessary to wait for yet another consultation period. The Minister for the Cabinet Office said on the "Today" programme this week:


She also said:


    We have got to have clear labelling for people to make their own choices.

The Government now have a chance to do that.

Mr. Tyler: The hon. Gentleman has quoted a number of Ministers, but I wonder whether he has carefully considered the Prime Minister's speech to the National Farmers Union, the main theme of which was the importance of ensuring that British consumers have access to good quality information about good quality food. That is also the theme of the hon. Gentleman's Bill.

I shall take this opportunity--as I may not get another--to quote the Prime Minister on that occasion. He said that the Government envisage


The Prime Minister's words may come to haunt him if the Government do not give the hon. Gentleman's Bill--and, dare I say it, my Bill--a fair wind.

Mr. O'Brien: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman's intervention gave him the opportunity to cover a slightly wider point, but I shall not pursue that, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for fear of losing your support.

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I intended to refer to the Government's present policy on genetically modified foods. However, I am conscious of the time and others want to contribute, so rather than go into that in detail I shall just cite the phrase, what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. What is sauce for GM foods must be right for other foods: they should also have labelling information about the country of origin and standards of production. If GM food is about anything, it is about standards of production as much as about ingredients. However, I shall refrain from commenting on what some call the Prime Minister's policy U-turn on GM foods.

My Bill would protect the well-being and freedom of choice of our citizens, and, above all, the health and safety of our children, who eat every type of food. It would lend great weight to this country's proud tradition of leading the world in animal welfare. It would be viewed positively by everyone, and is a rare chance for the House as a whole--and the Government if they truly care about honesty in food labelling--to achieve a political win-win. I commend the Bill to the House, and I hope that it has a speedy passage on to the statute book.

1.17 pm

Mr. Tony McWalter (Hemel Hempstead): I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to contribute to the debate. I welcome the initiative of the hon. Member for Eddisbury (Mr. O'Brien), and I am grateful to him for echoing a question that I asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food about the labelling of pigmeat.

The Bill is somewhat schizophrenic--and I am not sure whether a Committee can sort out schizophrenia. If I am asked to serve on the Committee considering the Bill, I hope that I can do my bit to put the patient in a better state. Those are slightly harsh words, but I think the Bill has a Euro-clobbering dimension, even though that may not have been intended. To get the Bill to be more Euro-compliant will prove quite taxing, although there is absolutely no doubt that the current labelling regime is highly prejudicial to British farmers and British agricultural production.

I have already given the House a brief account of my experience in trying to buy British bacon in a Somerfield supermarket in Stevenage, and I now have the opportunity to mention it at greater length. There was a cabinet full of bacon, but it proved almost impossible to buy a product that was recognisably compliant with the high standards of British pigmeat production that the hon. Gentleman rightly wants to protect. I found the words "produce of Europe", in minuscule characters, on most items; in other cases, it was "Dutch", "Danish", or something else. It was difficult to find any British bacon--but there at the bottom of the cabinet was a packet on which "Wiltshire cured" was written in extremely large letters. When I picked it up, I saw yet again, in the tiniest possible writing on the underside, "produce of Europe". I do not think that that necessarily meant that curing in the Wiltshire style had taken place in Wiltshire, and it certainly did not mean that the pigs had been reared in a way that complied with this country's higher standards of animal welfare. Eventually, I managed to buy some organic bacon at the store down the road.

We are told that there are currently 31 protected labels--"Wiltshire cured", "Newcastle Brown", "Scottish salmon" and so on--but that does not alter the fact that

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there are far more than 31 misleading labels. It is a nightmare for the trading standards officer who genuinely wants to prevent consumers from being misled, and, because the Bill makes a real effort to confront the problem, I welcome it. I did, however, describe the Bill as schizophrenic, and I want to identify some of the problems associated with it.

Clause 2--which is, in a sense, the core of the Bill--states:


Currently, British producers have every right to tell consumers that their food was produced in Britain: indeed, they have the capacity to use any kind of labelling that they want to use, as long as it is not regarded as market-obstructive.

I have much sympathy with those who are angry about the fact that the Union jack can be used by those who merely packaged the product at the end of the process. Let me say in passing that in one part of the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland--which, admittedly, is not directly affected by the Bill--the Union jack, unfortunately, has other connotations. Producers there have tried to get around the problem by featuring a bunch of violets in an attempt to convey a Northern Ireland identity; but most people in Northern Ireland still do not know what the logo really means.

That is the difficulty with labelling. What does a logo say about the product? Requiring a product to be labelled with the particulars of its country of origin is very different from permitting it. Under the Bill, if producers in America, for instance, have not stated on the label that 28 per cent. of the product comes from Mexico, 32 per cent. from Peru and the rest from the United States, the food in question will not be eligible to be sold. I deliberately cited countries outside the common market because strong country-of-origin regulations often apply to products imported to the European Union, although the Bill does not really deal with whether those regulations are consistent with the regulations mentioned in it.

Again, in the EU itself, the Bill might take us well out of kilter with what other countries would expect. The Bill's emphasis and compulsion would mean that such a product would not be eligible to be sold in this country. Obviously, it would be a strongly restrictive way in which to deal with the matter.


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