Horsemeat

Lord Elis-Thomas Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord De Mauley]

My noble friend makes an extremely important point. We are in constant discussion with retailers. I suspect that they may be somewhat on the back foot at the moment. That might be why they have not done as she wishes. It is important that they are not overconfident. Clearly, there has been some pretty rum business going on. My noble friend is absolutely right that confidence is extremely important and that we must do what we can to bring that confidence back to the market. We will do that by taking the steps we are taking.

[Lord Elis-Thomas]

My Lords, I know that the Minister understands the importance of involving the European Union, the devolved Administrations and the FSA. I warmly congratulate the FSA on it robust response, but does the Minister agree that the time may well come, when the crisis has been taken past its immediate difficulties, for us to have a review involving the FSA, our European partners and the devolved Administrations to ensure that we have the most effective way of dealing with the international complexity of the food chain?

[Lord De Mauley]

The noble Lord is absolutely right that what we have to do at the end of this is learn the important lessons. I entirely agree with him on that.