Horsemeat

Tom Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Tom Harris (Glasgow South) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Paterson]

I am conscious that other Members want to get in, so I will press on and make a little more progress.

It is clear that complex cross-European supply networks are involved in these incidents. I understand that Comigel was supplying customers in 16 European countries. That is why I have pressed hard for a European response. Yesterday, my Irish, French and Romanian counterparts, and the commissioner, were enthusiastic and united in wanting to work closely with us. I look forward to taking those discussions further tomorrow in Brussels.

I have made it clear to the food industry that I expect to see meaningful results from its product testing by this Friday. The results will be published as they become available.

--- Later in debate ---

[Laura Sandys (South Thanet) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott). In many ways, I shall continue the theme that she has introduced, albeit possibly from a different perspective. There are many other Members who know a lot more than I do about traceability and supply chain management, but I have done quite a lot of work on the food system as a whole.

Let us be frank: we are facing a crisis in the food system. The crisis relates not to the replacement horsemeat that we are discussing today. That is just one of the symptoms of the crisis relating to the cost of food. The food system, particularly in this country, is designed around cheap food. That is a business model that has developed over many decades, and it is because that model is changing that we are now seeing fraud within the system.

In the UK, food prices have risen dramatically over the past five years. The 32% increase in that period is double the EU average, and the problem is going to get worse. In April, we are likely to see a significant price increase owing to the American drought. The Russians have been imposing intermittent restrictions on exports, and it is extremely worrying that Ukraine, which has signed a debt swap with the Chinese, is seeking to secure that debt swap with its food commodities. Ukraine has been acting as Europe’s traditional hedging supplier for cost reduction in raw commodities.

The crisis is that the era of cheap food is now over. We all need to put in place policies and strategies to achieve the difficult result of smoothing the transition to a higher-priced food sector and ensuring that, despite the price rises, the families the hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington was talking about will be able to feed themselves with quality food and be sure that the food they are putting on their tables is what it says on the package.

I have not heard the Opposition put forward any strategies to address the fundamental issue that we are facing globally. Let me put some thoughts on that to the Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr Heath). First, the supermarkets —and possibly we politicians—must start to be straight with the public about rising food prices. Maybe after this disaster we will start to face up to the realities. It is not the supermarkets or the manufacturers that are absorbing the price rises; it is the consumers. Horsemeat replacement products are the result of a flawed business model, in that that has been seen as the only way to square the ludicrous circle of having cheap food in the shops and rocketing food prices in the supply chain.

Consumers are suffering not only from fraudulent food but from the substitution of the best ingredients with what some people call “arterial Polyfilla”. The £1 cottage pie in the local freezer shop that the hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington mentioned might have been the same price for the past five years, but will it still have the same contents? Will it contain less meat and have more high-fructose corn syrup, which some people call “heart attack central”? Packaging is also absorbing more price rises. Are people aware of how much fresh air they are buying in their cereal packets? Also, 60% of all products in supermarkets are now on promotion, but some of those promotions are misleading, as Which?, published by the Consumers Association, has rightly highlighted in its report on food promotions.

I am sure that the Government are now taking a new look at food policy. Over the past 15 years, they have more or less devolved the relationship between the consumer and food to the supermarkets. That has never been right, but it cannot now continue. We need to re-engineer our food policy around consumers, not around producers or retailers. We need to move from a “cheap as chips” model to one in which we value food. The new food cost reality might ultimately be better for the public and for our producers, but the transition is already very painful.

When I talk to the poorest families in my constituency, they tell me that they cannot afford to go to the supermarket any more. I might as well ask them whether they go to Harvey Nichols or Harrods. They get their food from pound shops, Aldi, Lidl, corner shops and street markets. Chips from the takeaway with ketchup or brown sauce will be dinner for the family.

Some of our strategies are interesting. They cover cooking and eating more healthily. Change for Life is a fantastic health programme in this country. The problem is, however, that Change for Life as a message is difficult when some of my families do not have enough time to change their clothes and they are in many ways intimidated by the thought of that type of proposition.

[Mr Tom Harris]

I am enjoying the hon. Lady’s speech a great deal, but I wonder where she is going with it. It is not necessarily a bad thing—I just wondered whether I could pre-empt the point she is perhaps coming on to. She said that we have to be realistic about the value of food. I felt that she was preparing us all to pay more for our food. How does that equate with her obvious sympathy with the poorest families in her constituency? How will they manage to make that leap if incomes stay as low as they are?

[Laura Sandys]

I think that that is a false choice. The issue is that we have stopped valuing, understanding and being able to use food. One thing has been a huge asset: this week, the Secretary of State for Education announced that food preparation and food cooking will be part of the national curriculum. Through such moves, we are creating a more resilient public. We cannot get away from the fact that global food prices are rising. We must support the poorest families in that transition. I do not believe that we need to eat less well, despite the rise in the food prices. What we need to do is to have greater transparency, much more resilience and greater skills to be able to use food more effectively.

Poorer families will be making cheaper choices, so it is crucial that labelling is transparent. Where is the flash on that cottage pie saying “30% less meat”? Government also need to look at tightening some of the regulations on food promotion. Products that are less expensive are going on promotion at more expensive prices. Retailers are shortening the period in which a product needs to be on full price before a discount is a true discount. That is another form of consumers absorbing price rises, but not absorbing them transparently.

We need not just a summit on food safety, but a commission on our whole food system, focusing on the consumer and ensuring that we stand shoulder to shoulder with the public who are going to have to manage the painful transition from a “cheap as chips” food model to a more expensive one. Families should be able to feed themselves as well in the new model if we provide the support and ensure that the retailers do not try to pretend that nothing has changed.

Burying our heads in the sand has got us to where we are now. Customers have had to face either lack of transparency or the actual experience of food fraud. Horsemeat in my view is only the beginning of this food crisis, if we do not face up to the realities of rising food prices and become the champion of the consumer.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Tom Harris (Glasgow South) (Lab)]

This has been an important and well-informed debate, and I wish to thank some Members individually for taking part. The hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh), my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson), the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Roger Williams), the hon. Members for South Thanet (Laura Sandys) and for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), my hon. Friend the Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) and the hon. Members for Sherwood (Mr Spencer) and for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) all made excellent speeches.

There can be few subjects more important to us as individuals than what we eat and what we feed to our children and family. I am only sorry that the Secretary of State was too busy to listen to a single speech made after his own.

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr David Heath)]

It is important that I put it on the record that the Secretary of State is having the phone meeting with the Dutch Minister that he mentioned to the House. It is also important that we make those connections.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Harris]

I look forward to the right hon. Gentleman reappearing in the Chamber, but I am grateful to the Minister of State for that clarification. I know that the Secretary of State has a busy schedule—he told us so. He said that he was meeting again today with the food industry, his second such meeting in four days. I thought that might be the meeting that took him away from the Chamber, and I would have congratulated him, but I realised that today’s meeting was not convened at short notice, or even as a response to the horsemeat scandal; it was convened last October to give the Secretary of State the opportunity to talk about waste and genetically modified food. It is good to see that, at least when it comes to his diary, the right hon. Gentleman has no problem with changing the label.

It is vital that we as consumers have full confidence that what we are eating is exactly what is stated on the packet and that Ministers are fighting our corner, but consumers watching the Secretary of State’s performance today and his statement yesterday will not have been encouraged. Many questions remain unanswered, so I hope that the Minister of State will answer them in his response. Some of them were asked yesterday but were left unanswered or were ignored by the right hon. Gentleman, who felt unable to answer them even today.

The Secretary of State told the House yesterday that he first became aware of the horsemeat problem on 15 January. Early in his statement, he said:

“On 15 January, the FSA was notified by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland of the results of its survey of processed beef products”.—[Official Report, 11 February 2013; Vol. 558, c. 608.]

Will the Minister of State clarify whether that communication on 15 January was the first time the FSA was aware that such tests were taking place? Was the FSA contacted by the Irish authorities at any time between mid-November and 15 January to alert the FSA to the fact that concerns about the adulteration of beef had sparked an analysis? If so, when was that first contact made? Were Ministers told at the outset? If not, why not?

I did not pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) at the start of my speech because I wanted to make special mention of her terrific speech, which the hon. Member for Romsey and Southampton North described as an excellent advert for vegetarianism. I tried vegetarianism once, but gave up after about a month because I really cannot stand mushrooms. After the statement yesterday, my hon. Friend asked a sensible question, which my hon. Friend the Member for Brent North repeated today, about an EU regulation that would limit to 50% the amount of fat and connective tissue that can be used to bulk up mincemeat. She asked about reports that the Government are seeking a derogation from that regulation. The Secretary of State dismissed her in an extremely curt and arrogant manner, which I am sure he, being a gentleman, now regrets. Will the Minister of State now answer that question? Are the Government seeking to exempt the UK from a measure that is aimed specifically at protecting the rights of consumers?

I know the Minister of State, who will respond to the debate, takes a keen interest in the Food Standards Agency. I know that because he told the “Food Programme” on Sunday not once, but twice, “I can only go on the information given to me by the Food Standards Agency.” Fine. Good. So will he now accept the advice of the chief executive of the FSA, who has said that retailers

“need to test significantly across the product range, across wider meat-based product ranges”?

She was talking about chicken and pork products. Will the Minister, who prides himself on listening to the advice of the FSA, heed her advice? Do the Government have a view on this at all? [Interruption.] The Minister will get his chance to respond. He does love to chunter from a sedentary position. I spent two years on the Science and Technology Committee with the hon. Gentleman, and he was a veritable ray of sunshine during those many overseas visits. He was great company and I have to say that he seems to have gone into an awful bad mood since he went on to the Government Front Bench. I am sure that after the next election—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I am sure we want to get back on to the subject of horsemeat. Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that the Minister has been eating it?

[Mr Harris]

I am getting back in the saddle right now, Mr Deputy Speaker.

The Minister of State warned Members a few weeks ago that we should not talk down the British food industry, and he is right, but given the huge number of jobs that the industry supports and its importance to our economy does he recognise that the industry can be undermined by other factors? Does he accept that ministerial inaction and indecisiveness can be far more damaging to the industry?

In mid-November Irish authorities were concerned enough about contamination of meat products—sorry, adulteration of meat products—some of which were headed to the United Kingdom, that they initiated tests without, according to UK Ministers, informing the UK Government of their initial concerns. Four weeks ago Irish authorities alerted the UK Government that they had discovered horsemeat in burgers stocked in a number of UK supermarkets. Last Monday it was revealed that pies and pasties labelled as halal and served in UK prisons had tested positive for pig DNA. Last Thursday, reports emerged that the scandal had spread from frozen burgers to frozen ready meals.

Cue a sudden blur of belated action from the Secretary of State. On Saturday, he finally got round to meeting the British food industry to discuss the growing crisis. His food Minister had a least got round to meeting the industry before, once, one week previously. As my hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State said yesterday, “Crisis, what crisis?” At last, yesterday, the Secretary of State deigned to come to the House to berate Opposition Members for having the audacity to question him about this mess. As with the ash dieback issue, he has taken a very laid-back and relaxed approach to the issue—an attitude that, I have to tell him, is not shared by British consumers and their families.

When sales fall, when confidence in our food industry plummets, no doubt Ministers will reach for the nearest microphone to decry “scare mongering” by Opposition politicians. Who knows? Perhaps an unfortunate young relation of the Secretary of State will be encouraged to eat a Findus lasagne live on telly! But it will not be those on the Opposition Benches who are responsible for the collapse in trust. Consumers, yes, and voters well know where the blame lies.

A number of Members have highlighted the lack of an active criminal investigation. When pressed on this yesterday by my colleague, the shadow Secretary of State, the Secretary of State said that

“she went on and on about the police”.—[Official Report, 11 February 2013; Vol. 558, c. 613.]

Really? Does the Secretary of State really think that such a patronising and condescending manner is the way to win support in the House on such an issue? May I suggest to the Secretary of State and to his deputy that a bit of humility would not go amiss? I say this as a non-practitioner myself, but I hear it works wonders. Even if ministerial action had so far been above criticism, such a manner would be inappropriate, and Ministers’ actions so far have been far from being above criticism.

The shadow Secretary of State was right to go on about the police. The Secretary of State himself has repeatedly stated that the adulteration is a result of “an international criminal conspiracy” and “a straight fraud”. In line with this, the Irish Government confirmed on Monday 4 February that the Garda and fraud specialists had been called in to investigate.

The shadow Secretary of State passed the details of more British companies alleged to be involved in the scandal to the Serious Organised Crime Agency last Friday and to the FSA on Saturday. On the same Friday, the FSA revealed that the police were involved, but that no live criminal investigation was active. Yesterday, the Secretary of State said that until there was criminal action in this country, the police could not take action. Is that really the case? Will he confirm that he thinks criminals are present everywhere in Europe except the United Kingdom?

I delayed reference to the first-class and powerful speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott). I want to echo some of her comments. I hope we will not use this debate and crisis as an excuse to tax supermarkets, which, despite their drawbacks, have made affordable, quality food available to ordinary families throughout the country. However, with massive retail power comes huge responsibility—to make sure that the items sold are precisely as described as on the labels. I was glad to hear the Secretary of State echo that sentiment.

We all see the value of sourcing products locally. Many Members have understandably used this debate to promote local produce, but that is far too complacent—ignoring the realities of economic and time pressures on modern families, simply to advise consumers to buy the ingredients of lasagne in their corner shops rather than a ready meal at Asda or Tesco. It is also too easy for the Secretary of State to dismiss his responsibilities by saying repeatedly that retailers have ultimate responsibility for the content of food. Unless he wants the “F” removed from DEFRA, it is incumbent on him to carry out the responsibilities he already has.

I know that the Secretary of State believes in a laissez-faire form of government—he thinks that the Government should not get involved in the running of people’s lives. He seems to have taken that a step further, seeming to believe that the Government should not get involved in the running of the Government. The FSA is independent, but that does not prevent the Secretary of State’s from asking it what kind of testing it plans to carry out.

I shall wind up now, Mr Deputy Speaker. There are two types of Government: the one whose Ministers are so confident, competent and on top of their briefs that from the Opposition Benches government looks easy. Then there is the other type—the Government whose members never seem well briefed or surefooted, but always seem to be behind the curve, making the wrong decisions too late. Such a Government leave the Opposition with the distinct impression that almost anyone else could do a better job. There is no doubt about which category this Government fall into.