Food Waste

Debate between Daniel Kawczynski and Anne Main

Wednesday 14th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Anne Main (St Albans) (Con)]

It is with a degree of regret that I want to oppose the Bill—not the whole Bill, just a tiny bit of it. With all the good will intended in my speech, I hope to draw the hon. Lady’s attention to my concern.

May I first congratulate the hon. Lady, as she absolutely right that too much food is wasted and that many things could be done to ensure that more food is utilised rather than wasted. I was particularly disappointed when Open Door in St Albans lost the food that had been available from Marks & Spencer because of the very worry to which the hon. Lady has referred—that it would face liability if something went wrong. That was a real wasted resource.

The problem that I hope can be addressed as the Bill makes progress—in some ways, I hope it does; I am worried about only a tiny bit of it—is the provision that refers to

“food…unfit for human consumption”

being made

“available for livestock feed in preference over disposal”.

I am completely sympathetic to the aims behind that, but I remind the hon. Lady that in June 1988, the Government banned the use of mammalian products in feeds destined for ruminants. She might remember that, unfortunately, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease was contributed to by the prion that existed when mammalian products were put into the feed of ruminants. The disease’s spread was not stopped and, in March 1996, the Government banned the use of all flesh in the feeds for domestic animals because the prion linked to CJD lived through the processing of the two products.

I ask the hon. Lady—I am sure everyone is hugely sympathetic to what she wants to achieve with the Bill—whether she could tweak the wording so that there is no obligation to make all food waste available for animal feed. I hope that that would stop any future recurrence of inappropriate foods being fed to livestock and diseases potentially crossing the species divide.

That is my only objection to the Bill, and I congratulate the hon. Lady on presenting it. I am one of the old school who look at an apple and, if it is not wrinkly with a few things growing out of the top of it, will happily eat it regardless of the date on the label. My children look at the top of a yoghurt pot and say, “Oh mum, that was due to be thrown out yesterday,” but the hon. Lady is absolutely right: we have moved too far down the road of throwing away perfectly good, edible food. Years ago, people would use common sense to determine whether food was still edible.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

I use food a week after the date on the label.

[Mrs Main]

My hon. Friend says that he eats things with green mould on them.

[Daniel Kawczynski]

No—not green mould.

[Mrs Main]

My concern relates only to the small part of the Bill that requires all food products to be available for processing. If that could be tweaked, I would withdraw my objection.

Question put and agreed to.

Ordered,

That Kerry McCarthy, Luciana Berger, Robert Flello, Andrew George, Zac Goldsmith, Kate Green, Caroline Lucas, Dame Joan Ruddock, Laura Sandys, Henry Smith, Joan Walley and Dr Alan Whitehead present the Bill.

Kerry McCarthy accordingly presented the Bill.

Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 27 April 2012, and to be printed (Bill 318).