Examination of Witnesses (Questions 589-599)
MR NEIL
MARTINSON AND
MS ROSEMARY
HIGNETT
20 JULY 2004
Q589 Chairman: Good afternoon, ladies
and gentlemen. Welcome back to Rosemary Hignett and Neil Martinson
from the Food Standards Agency. Thank you very much indeed for
returning to our evidence session this afternoon. My apologies
once again for the way we had to end the session last week and
we are grateful that you have returned today. Could I begin by
asking for your views as to how clear it is who and which departments
within government have responsibility for food policy? It has
been suggested in some quarters that it is fragmented in certain
ways. How far do you find the different parts of government work
together and relate to what you do as an agency?
Mr Martinson: The Agency has concordats
in place with both Defra and the Department of Health. They spell
out the principles and in some cases some degree of detail as
to what the division of responsibilities is. In relation to the
Food Standards Agency, it is fairly clear that we are responsible
for issues in relation to food safety, food standards and enforcement,
and also in providing primarily the evidence and the advice in
relation to nutrition policy.
Q590 Chairman: Are you aware of any cross-departmental
working bodies being set up, for example, in which you have an
involvement?
Mr Martinson: There are a considerable
number of cross-departmental working bodies on anything from BSE
to contributions to the Food and Health Action Plan. I cannot
list them all but there is a very significant number, and, of
course, officials work on a daily basis across departments on
particular issues.
Q591 Mr Mitchell: I got the impression
from the retailers that you focus heavily and heavy-handedly on
them primarily so that as soon as a food scare hits the headlines,
now almost weekly, you come down heavily on the retailers because
that is the most convenient point of access for you. Do you accept
that charge that you are working most assiduously on the retailers
rather than any other section of the food chain?
Mr Martinson: What we try to do
is deal with the issues as they arise in a fair and consistent
and proportionate way. Clearly, in terms of the retailers, they
do represent a very significant part of the market. Some 90-odd
per cent of consumers buy their food from the major supermarket
retail chains, so inevitably if, for example, we are doing a survey,
which is quite often based on market share, retailers will appear
fairly high up, but certainly we would say that we deal with it
in a fair and consistent way.
Q592 Mr Mitchell: Yes, but things like
labelling go right back down the food chain, do they not? How
do you ensure that your message is going to reach the key players
before the supermarkets?
Mr Martinson: We also have a relationship
with the major manufacturers through organisations like the Food
and Drink Federation, and clearly in terms of any of our major
surveys major branded products appear in them as well, so I do
not think we quite accept that particular line of argument.
Q593 Mr Mitchell: That is surveys that
you are talking about, but when it comes to labelling and instructions
it is easiest for you, is it not, to work through the supermarkets
and tell them they must do so-and-so? My impression is that that
is what you do because it is an easy way out.
Ms Hignett: When we are developing
labelling policy we always discuss our ideas and the issues with
all stakeholders and that will always include the retailers. We
also always include manufacturers and it will also include enforcers
and the catering sector where that is relevant. We are always
careful to involve everybody in those discussions. Certainly,
as Mr Martinson has said, retailers are major players so they
must expect to be involved.
Q594 Mr Mitchell: You referred to a proportionate
response. What is a proportionate response? When you get these
food panics developing and the Daily Mail highlights something
as dangerous, children are dying and shock, horror, how do you
respond because they are going to blame you, are they not?
Mr Martinson: If we could just
deal with the issue of what have been called food scares, over
the last four years what we have been doing is dealing with food
safety issues in a much more transparent way, and when there is
an issue all the major players involved are aware in advance of
what the particular issue is. They are informed in advance of
the action that the Agency is taking. If I could just quote from
our annual consumer survey about the issues around food scares,
when we have asked people, "How concerned are you about different
issues?", in the year 2001 around 11% said they were concerned
about food scares. In a later survey, 2003, around 2% of consumers
said it was an issue for them. What we think is that in the way
that we manage food safety now, both by informing and involving
stakeholders across the spectrum (and we also involve consumer
groups) but also by being transparent, it has helped to improve
confidence in food safety in the United Kingdom.
Q595 Mr Mitchell: That is interesting;
that is a cheering statistic. Does that mean you have anticipated
most of the food scares in advance so you have got them on your
agenda?
Mr Martinson: I do not think we
can always anticipate any food scare that is going to come up,
but what it does demonstrate is that it pays to be transparent,
that in terms of some of the headlines that you might see in some
newspapers it does not necessarily translate that all consumers
are taking that message away with them. They will base it on their
own experiences as well.
Q596 Chairman: Can I follow up Mr Mitchell's
point regarding the impression that it is the supermarkets which
perhaps get the focus of attention? We had questions last week,
as you will recall, on the catering sector and the type of information
that this sector provides to its customers. What you told us last
week was that this was an area in which there were encouraging
noises that more needed to be done. It did not strike me that
this was an area which at present was being regarded as a priority
by yourselves and yet it is one which is obviously important to
many consumers in terms of the information they get about the
choices they make. Does that not perhaps back up the kind of suggestion
that Mr Mitchell was making about the emphasis of your work?
Ms Hignett: I do not see us as
giving priority to any particular sector. I think there is a distinction
between pre-packed foods where inevitably the discussions focus
on manufacturers and retailers and non-pre-packed foods where
the food service sector is more important and the issues become
more difficult and more challenging in the food service sector
because it is difficult to think in terms of a one-size-fits-all
solution because the range of operations is so wide. Whilst for
pre-packed foods the discussions tend to focus on legislation
at EU level and then voluntary action in the UK, in relation to
the food service sector the starting point is slightly different.
The starting point is one which is very much focused on what it
is practical to achieve rather than a legislative starting point.
Q597 Joan Ruddock: I do not know whether
the FSA did the research or whether it published the research,
but it is the issue of organic baby food recently in which it
was stated that there were more organic baby foods containing
higher levels of dioxins than non-organic baby foods. I wondered
what the FSA thought it was doing in terms of communicating to
the public when all of the products surveyed had dioxins that
were very well within the safety levels? What was it you were
trying to achieve in commenting on that research?
Mr Martinson: We did not make
the comment in terms of organic baby food. I think that was made
by a Scottish newspaper. We do a wide-ranging number of surveys
where we try to benchmark the level of contaminants that may be
in a range of foods and in that way we are able to use it partly
in terms of dietary information so it is possible to find out
if in fact the picture is getting better or worse. In terms of
most environmental contaminants the picture is getting much better.
There is a reduction. When we published that, which we published
on our website, we made it very clear that on the basis of expert
advice there was no reason to be concerned about the level of
contaminants because they were all well below any levels that
would give any reason for any parent to be concerned across both
organic and conventional baby foods.
Q598 Joan Ruddock: Does that not pose
a problem though, because this could amount to a food scare for
parents who have very specifically chosen organic baby foods because
they want their babies to be safe? Here is a suggestion that dioxins,
which most people believe are very unsafe, are more present and
yet we all know that they were well within the safety limits.
What do you feel about the message that you have communicated
and your responsibilities for that?
Mr Martinson: I do not think we
communicated that particular message. In terms of the work that
we do in relation to surveys, we find what we find and we have
an obligation to report that and make it accessible, not least
because it is used by scientists all over the world in terms of
collecting data. I think it is regrettable that it was reported
in that way, and obviously what we do is seek to avoid that, but
we cannot control such reporting.
Q599 Mr Jack: You have made some important
points about what consumers should know about the food that they
are eating. Is it important for consumers to have some benchmark
by which to judge, for example, messages about salt, sugar, fibre
and other nutritious intakes on a daily basis?
Ms Hignett: Yes. I think the major
problem with the nutrition information as we have it at the moment
on foods is that it is just a number given in isolation, so it
depends if you like either on the manufacturer voluntarily giving
some contextual information or on the consumer bringing a rule
of thumb of some sort to the party. Consumers may not in fact
have the ability to do that.
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