Food: Marketing

(asked on 12th April 2021) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to his Department's Tackling obesity strategy published in July 2020, for what reason restrictions on the promotion and placement of products that are high in fat, salt and sugar proposed in that strategy are (a) set out separately from the proposed restrictions on advertising of those products and (b) not contained in the Health and Care Bill.


Answered by
Jo Churchill Portrait
Jo Churchill
Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 28th April 2021

We have been careful to consider the views of stakeholders and experts as we developed our plans for implementing the healthy weight strategy, including restrictions on advertising and promotions. This process will continue as these measures pass through Parliament ensuring there is adequate time for scrutiny. Different legislative approaches being pursued reflect the current legislative framework and implementation routes available to the Government. For the promotions restrictions, we intend to use powers in the Food Safety Act (FSA) 1990 to lay secondary legislation before Parliament by mid-2021. The statutory instrument will be subject to the affirmative parliamentary procedure.

Subject to the outcome of the consultations on further advertising restrictions on TV and online, we intend to legislate through the Health and Care Bill. For online advertising restrictions primary legislation has to be used because there is no existing legislation on which to build. The decision was taken that the TV aspect should also be implemented through primary legislation because the two policies are closely aligned.

Reticulating Splines