Hansard

I am pleased to be taking part in the debate. The bill sets out the operational detail for food standards Scotland. I think that everyone in the chamber supports the general principles, but I will make one point about the board’s membership. Although the committee supports the Government proposals on the board’s membership, it does not support the proposal on sectoral representatives. I ask the minister to reflect on the Mather commission’s report, which the Scottish Government welcomed at the time, which recommends employee directors for public body boards. The establishment of food standards Scotland gives the Government the opportunity to act on the issue. Given the particular responsibilities of food standards Scotland and the key importance of the consumer, it would be important to have employee representation on the board in some form.

Although it was the Health and Sport Committee that scrutinised the Food (Scotland) Bill and it is the Minister for Public Health who is putting the case to us today, food standards Scotland is an organisation whose responsibility will extend to the food inspection regime in Scotland, covering work in abattoirs and meat plants, as well as issues around accurate labelling and food fraud. I will focus on those issues.

A few weeks ago, I spoke at The Scotsman conference on food and drink during food and drink fortnight. At the conference there was a clear emphasis on Scotland’s strong brand, on our international reputation and on provenance and transparency in our food sector. It was recognised that if Scotland’s food and drink sector is to grow, make a significant contribution to our economy and offer quality employment opportunities, those strengths must be promoted and protected.

The establishment of a new food standards body—we all support the necessity of a separate Scottish body for the reasons that others have outlined—gives us an opportunity to be clear about our expectations on the operation of the food sector and to introduce a robust regulatory regime that puts the consumer firmly at its centre.

There are some real challenges in the sector. It is a tough sector and food production is highly competitive. It operates on very narrow profit margins and we can see the impact of that. Recently, four free-range chicken producers’ contracts with Hook 2 Sisters were terminated. That will result in the total number of independent chicken producers in Scotland falling from 28 to 16 and the number of chickens produced in Scotland falling by 7 million birds at a time when chicken consumption is increasing.

We all recognise the pressures that are on food producers—rising prices, pressure from the supermarkets and increasing competition from overseas—but we cannot allow them to lead to any weakening of our regulation. The numbers of meat inspectors and meat inspections have fallen in recent years. They exist to protect the consumer, but they also protect Scotland’s brand and reputation.

In a recent Bank of Scotland report on the food and drink sector, 64 per cent of those questioned identified regulation and compliance as a significant challenge for their sector, but any damage to our sector, which would be left vulnerable with light-touch regulation, would take years to recover from. We know that from recent examples. We need to ensure that the sector’s well-earned reputation is protected. Although all effort must be made to have regulation that is proportionate, it must also be robust and effective.

Let us consider some of the realities within the sector. A recent freedom of information request by Unison Scotland showed that, since April 2012, meat inspectors and vets have prevented more than 1 million cases of diseased animal carcases from entering the food chain. That included 659,000 instances of liver fluke parasite and 427,000 instances of pneumonia in red meat carcases. The figures are pretty concerning, but the fact that we have a meat inspection regime means that diseased carcases are being detected before they reach the human food chain.

There is intense lobbying at European Union level for lighter-touch regulation that increasingly looks to pass the responsibility from the public sector to the industry. There are real concerns about the consequences of that for the consumer. Already, 37 out of the 87 poultry plants across the UK have employed their own meat inspectors. For me, that raises issues of accountability and conflict of interest.

The creation of a new body in Scotland gives us an opportunity to ensure that regulation acts in the interests of the consumer. Two of the body’s objectives clearly emphasise protection of the consumer. Although measures must be proportionate and support the industry, it must also be demonstrated that they deserve the public’s trust. Trust must be at the heart of the new body. It needs to be able to hold the public’s confidence. Sections of the industry are failing and we certainly need to work with them to challenge that and to raise standards.

However, they also need to be transparent and accountable. Meat inspectors and vets must be able to carry out thorough, independent inspections, free from food sector influence. Of course there are people in the sector who recognise that and the value of the system, but we need only to speak to some of the people who work on the factory floor to get an understanding of how tough the sector can be, how hard the working conditions are, how pressured the sector is to produce the end product quickly, how difficult it can be to go in and enforce the inspection regime and how essential it is to have a robust regulatory regime with independent scrutiny.

The new body—food standards Scotland—must have a clear position on that and support its staff who work at the sharp end, because another reality is that produce at the lower end of the sector is more vulnerable. The demand for cheap food from the retail sector and the consumer puts pressure on the sector, but we cannot allow the low-income consumer to be left vulnerable to poor practice. The recently highlighted growth in food fraud, which ranges from counterfeiting to mislabelling and substitution, is also a significant challenge for the new body to address.

I will close with some concerns about environmental health officers—in particular, issues of capacity and underfunding.

At the height of the horsemeat scandal last year, the pressure on local authority services became clear. In 2008, more than 16,000 food safety samples were taken throughout Scotland but budgetary pressures meant that, by 2012, that had dropped to just over 10,000 samples. There had also been a 21 per cent drop in the number of specialist food safety officers who were employed by local authorities.

Increasingly, the capacity does not exist to carry out regular checks. If we want a service to be delivered that meets the challenges of the modern world, it needs to be better supported by not just local government, which faces financial pressures, but central Government and the new food standards body.

The bill establishes the legal standing of food standards Scotland. The debate will now move on to the new body’s policy and practice. If we are prepared to put the interests of the consumer first, everyone—including the industry—will benefit from the advantages of safe, high-quality, respected and trusted Scottish produce.