Oral Answers to Questions

Neil Parish Excerpts

Thursday 13th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

I certainly welcome the hon. Lady’s interest in this matter. As she will know, country of origin labelling is already mandatory for unprocessed beef, pork, sheep and goat meat, poultry, fruit and vegetables, olive oil, fish, shellfish, wine and honey. There are many additional voluntary schemes, which we are keen to support. As she points out, there will be further opportunities, as we leave the EU, to look at what more consumers would like to see from labelling.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

The dairy industry has not really been able to label properly the Great British cheese, butter and milk that is the best in the world. Can we now take this opportunity to ensure that we get the British flag and label on our dairy products?

[Andrea Leadsom]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point. He and I share an ambition for the strongest possible promotion of Great British food. He will be aware that the majority of dairy and processed meat products are compliant with the industry’s voluntary principles for origin labelling, but we can, of course, always do more, and we are working with the industry to look at what those options are.