Why won't MPs act on healthy food?

Denis Campbell bemoans the lack of government intervention on healthy food.

Am I alone in thinking that the case for far tougher regulation of the food industry grows more compelling almost every day?

The last fortnight has brought alarming revelations, first about just how many snack foods and drinks beloved by children contain artificial additives, and then how commonly pesticides turn up in what we eat.

This is a business that works to maximise private profit, even if it is at the expense of the public's health. Look at the number of "two-for-one" and other money-saving offers available on waistline-expanding products which are high in fat, salt or sugar, like sweet treats, and the scarcity of them on healthier options; "healthy eating" dishes that are anything but.

Remember talk of the traffic light food labelling system, designed to make it easier for customers to buy healthier products? That one was recommended by the government's Food Standards Agency. Many of the biggest players, such as Tesco, refused to take part - despite the obvious benefits for a population that is, as we report in the Observer today, too often still confused about what constitutes a healthy, balanced diet. So much for corporate social responsibility. Why doesn't Gordon Brown make the red, amber and green labels compulsory?

Consider how the industry lobbied to defeat attempts by leading health and children's organisations to secure a 9pm watershed on the advertising of junk food, to protect children's health. It was a depressing saga, all the more for being so instructive about the government's near-total failure to properly regulate this hugely important area of British life.

I realise that food producers and supermarkets are commercial outfits, not extensions of the local public health department. But the deleterious effects of some of their products - kids who are overweight or disruptive at school - mean continuing to let them run their own affairs as they see fit should no longer be an option.

We don't trust MPs, the police, broadcasters, health professionals or lawyers to run their own affairs completely free from outside, independent scrutiny. The principle that proper regulation benefits the public, regardless of the vested interests involved, should be extended to the food industry as a matter of urgency.

Why do we allow almost unfettered and irresponsible promotion of such poor food products? Ministers lament the scale of the obesity epidemic, but have done shamefully little to tackle it. Growing evidence suggests too much food contains too much rubbish, yet Whitehall does little to ensure the dramatic reformulation of products so clearly needed.

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