A landmark report landed on prime minister Keir Starmer’s desk just three months into his time as PM, urging ministers to hold the food industry “to account“ for the obesity crisis, and exclude it from future public health policymaking.

Among a huge list of draconian recommendations made by the much-hyped House of Lords Food, Diet and Obesity Committee report were proposals to give the FSA powers to enforce mandatory health targets, expand existing HFSS taxes and adopt the (much tougher) 2018 nutrient profiling model as the basis for the junk food ad ban and in-store promotion restrictions.

Sound familiar? Well it should.

Today’s report from the cross-party Health & Social Care Committee, aimed at the new occupant of No 10, Andy Burnham, bears an uncanny resemblance to the Lords’ report. It too, comes with an extensive list of recommendations, most of which share a common theme: it’s time for ministers to abandon a partnership approach with industry and instead embrace tougher ‘nanny state’ regulation to tackle the nation’s health problems.

The big question now, is whether Burnham, unlike Starmer and Rachel Reeves, will listen. More than a decade after calling for a crackdown on junk food advertising and HFSS food as Labour shadow health secretary, he is prepared to go take on the food and broadcasting industries again – but this as the man in charge of the government?

Ramping up the junk food ad ban

Burnham has previously attacked the Tories for being “too close to commercial interests” and, as Mayor of Manchester, was spearheading efforts to ban all “junk food” ads from the city’s transport network.

Yet a complete ban on all outdoor advertising for HFSS brands is just one of the recommendations in this week’s report. Taken together, the proposals would represent the biggest state crackdown in history on an industry that employs 3.6 million people across the UK. And that’s before counting the additional impact on the marketing and broadcasting sectors.

The HSCC is calling for the junk food ad ban, which only came into force in January, to be significantly strengthened. It also wants to ramp up the in-store promotions ban and force supermarkets to give healthy foods prime positioning,  extend the soft drink sugar levy and give the Food Standards Agency new powers to oversee health reporting and mandatory targets. Under these proposals, supermarkets could be hit with heavy fines if they fail to respond.

Food trade bodies, on the other hand, would be stripped of their ability to represent the industry in the policymaking negotiation room.

Burnham is already going to have his hands full taking the Labour Party in a new direction while delivering on promises around jobs, living standards and economic growth. The extent to which he is willing to take on business interests while also tackling the cost of living and keeping food prices in check remains unclear.

It would seem unlikely that, given the current economic and political backdrop, he will embrace policies that risk driving up the price of products for the “hard-working people” politicians often claim to champion.

But that does not mean he won’t go further than Starmer and Reeves, who are understood to have intervened more than once to put the brakes on public health policies that could be percieved as “anti-business”.

Tougher action on health

Giving a new regulatory role to the FSA is not a new idea. It was proposed by the Lords but also included in Wes Streeting’s 10-year- NHS plan and last month received funding to begin developing a system of mandatory reporting and targets.

Likewise a switch to the “new” 2018 nutrient profiling model has already been proposed by the Labour government, even though decisions on both that proposal and mandatory reporting have been put on hold amid the upheaval at the top of government. These delays come alongside opposition from the industry, which argues the proposals would be “unworkable” and commercially damaging.

Health campaigners, however, believe a Burnham government is less likely to delay, dilute or abandon these proposals.

They argue there is scope for tougher action with which businesses could live. Closing advertising loopholes, boosting the in-store promotions ban and improving transparency around reporting could all, they say, be embraced by the food industry without wreaking too much economic havoc.

Elsewhere in this week’s report, however, the recommendations become far more contentious. As with the Lords report before it, it is hard to see how the incoming PM could implement some of the proposals without pushing the nuclear button on relations with a raft of industries he will need onside. 

A more dynamic and better communicated approach to public health policy is one thing, but the prospect of Burnham slamming the door on the food industry altogether remains far l

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