Hansard

PE1978, which was lodged by Cristina Rosique-Esplugas, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to allow raw drinking milk to be sold in Scotland, bringing it in line with England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and to allow farmers the opportunity to sell unpasteurised drinking milk. We last considered the petition on 18 January, when we agreed to write to the Food Standards Agency, Food Standards Scotland, the NFU Scotland and Dairy UK. We wrote to those organisations, partly on the recommendation of Mr Sweeney, who was a member of the committee at the time, and of Mr Ewing, because we wanted to understand why there was a difference in policy. We have now received responses from the organisations, with Dairy UK agreeing with Food Standards Scotland’s view that raw drinking milk has posed a significant risk to the public in the past. Dairy UK also believes that compulsory pasteurisation has helped to protect consumers in Scotland and should continue to be in place. NFU Scotland shares that view, believing that the risks of selling raw milk significantly outweigh the benefits. Food Standards Scotland’s response provides information on the decision that was taken in 2006 to retain the ban on the sale of raw cows’ milk and to extend it to other species, which was based on widespread support from industry, enforcers and public health bodies. Food Standards Scotland highlights that, although raw drinking milk is available in other UK nations, bans and restrictions on the sale of those products are in place in several European Union nations, as well as in several states in the United States of America. The Food Standards Agency has provided information on the restrictions that apply to the sale of raw cows’ milk in England, Wales and Northern Ireland; it also shares details of the policy review that was conducted in 2018, which looked at the current controls and made recommendations for enhanced controls. That led to the industry guidance that was published in 2020, which reinforces the advice that raw drinking milk might contain harmful bacteria. The Food Standards Agency notes that it has regular productive meetings with the Raw Milk Producers Association. The committee has also received a submission from the petitioner, which suggests that the information that was provided by Food Standards Scotland and others might not present a complete picture of the level of risk that is posed by unpasteurised milk products. The petitioner highlights information from a senior researcher at Utrecht University, which argues that inappropriate evidence has been used to affirm that raw milk is a high-risk food. At the time, we very much sought views without an expectation that a change in policy would be likely. If we had hoped to understand why the policy in Scotland is different to that of the rest of the UK, I do not think that any of the responses that we have received identifies that. However, they are all unequivocal in their determination that we have the right policy in place and that it should remain in place. It is to that point that the Scottish Government has responded. I should also seek the committee’s guidance in that we have received an unsolicited additional submission, and, under our new policy, we have to determine whether, by exception, to accept it. I thank the submissioner for the submission, but I do not know that it adds materially to the evidence that we have been considering, so I am inclined to suggest that we do not accept the additional submission on this occasion. Mr Torrance, you look as though you are ready to offer a comment.