National Food Strategy Independent Review

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Tuesday 20th July 2021 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they will take in response to the recommendations of the National Food Strategy independent review, published on 15 July.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Benyon) (Con)]

My Lords, we should like to thank Henry Dimbleby and his team for their work on this independent review. We are committed to carefully considering the review and its recommendations and responding with a White Paper in the next six months setting out the Government’s ambition and priorities for the food system. That will support our exceptional British food and drink producers, protecting and enhancing the nation’s health and the natural environment for generations to come.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for that reply. There was considerable dismay in many quarters last week at the Prime Minister’s public perfunctory dismissal of the National Food Strategy’s recommendations on the need for sugar and salt taxes. Can the Minister ensure that all levels of government understand that the sugar tax on soft drinks that this Government—or, I should say, Mrs May’s Government—introduced in 2018 was seen generally as a success? It did not raise prices but instead encouraged manufacturers to reformulate their products on a healthier basis. Why should the principle of that sugar tax not be extended to help ease the country’s obesity crisis and a salt tax be similarly explored, instead of being so summarily dismissed?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

The noble Lord is absolutely right to say that the soft drinks industry levy—it is not a tax—has been a great success. The sales-weighted average sugar content per 100 millilitres in fizzy drinks reduced by 43.7% between 2015 and 2019. It is worth looking at how Henry Dimbleby has nuanced his recommendations by proposing a look at wholesale sugar and salt used by the industry to make food items that are becoming a serious problem to the health of this country.