Controversy continues over the Government’s planned food health labeling website, which earlier this month was pulled down by Assistant Health Minister, Fiona Nash, whose former chief of staff, Alastair Furnival, had interests in a public relations company which had lobbied on behalf of food companies.
The website, which had been created after two years of careful study and consultation by a committee of health, industry and consumer groups, was designed to enable industry to calculate their own star ratings and begin voluntarily displaying them on packaging. Under the system, foods would be assigned ratings out of five based on their concentrations of sugar, salt and saturated/trans fats.
The system is intended to break-down the information asymmetry impacting most shoppers. How many of us, for example, know that a typical can of soft drink contains around 10 teaspoons of sugar, or that “low fat yogurt” – so often marketed as healthy – is also chock-full of sugar and often less healthy than its full fat cousin?
By simplifying information about the nutritional content of the foods we eat, and better informing consumer choices, it is also hoped that food companies would modify their products and provide more healthy alternatives. After all, if unhealthy options lose market share, food companies would be required to adjust their offerings or suffer financially.
The system is also intended to make longer-term cost savings to government, since good health starts with good eating, and better population health would take pressure off the health and medical system.
With these points in mind, it’s curious that self-proclaimed “fat” Liberal-National Queensland MP, Ewan Jones, has dismissed the healthy food labeling reforms, claiming the Government should get out of people’s lives:
“I carry weight, I am actually fat. It’s not the Government that makes me fat… I don’t need a government to come and tell me that what I’m eating is wrong”…
“When I’m opening up a tub of ice-cream, I’m not looking at the rating, I’m not opening it because it’s low-calorie, low-fat or because it’s good for me”…
“I’m opening it up because it’s chock-a-block full of chocolate”…
Asked how he believed the Government should best combat obesity and its huge costs to the taxpayers, Mr Jones said education was the key.
“I think it’s through education and education in school, through healthy examples in schools, but not down to tuckshops,” he said.
I fail to see what Jones’ issue is. The Government is not proposing a ban on junk food, but rather a mechanism whereby consumers are given greater ability to make healthier choices. He would still be able to eat himself into an early grave, if that’s his wish. In fact, he’ll be better equipped to do so.
His claim that education is the key to healthier eating, but that the Government should not implement healthier labeling, is also contradictory. Both approaches aim to influence behaviour so that the population makes healthier choices.
Let’s hope Jones punches below his weight in the Coalition party room.
