Government's junk food plan leak reveals it will not restrict marketing or TV ads
Lobbyists have reportedly been successful in eroding imminent junk food legislation such as the sugar tax while the government has been distracted by European matters.
Sugar
Government junk food crackdown plans, due to be released the week starting Monday 18 July, do not propose any measures to restrict how unhealthy food is marketed. Furthermore, the watered down scheme will not force manufacturers to make healthier goods.
The Times, which has had access to the documents, also said that a ban on junk food at supermarket checkouts has been scrapped in addition to an end of junk food TV ads airing before 9pm.
The report said that health secretary Jeremy Hunt “faces a battle with his new cabinet colleagues to “put the teeth back” in the plan.”
Graham MacGregor, director of Action on Sugar, told the Times: “It’s a pathetic plan and it won’t have any effect on childhood obesity. Last year it was a really good plan but it’s been gradually eroded. Theresa May has got to go back and revise this completely.”