Contribution
I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for ensuring that this debate took place, and I am particularly grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Dr Opher) for securing it in the first place. I am also grateful to all Members for their valuable contributions. We have heard speeches from across the House, including from my hon. Friends the Members for Bolton South and Walkden (Yasmin Qureshi), for Chelsea and Fulham (Ben Coleman), for Ilford South (Jas Athwal), for Swindon North (Will Stone), for Liverpool West Derby (Ian Byrne), for Washington and Gateshead South (Mrs Hodgson), for Worthing West (Dr Cooper), for Southend East and Rochford (Mr Alaba), for Blackpool South (Chris Webb), for Bathgate and Linlithgow (Kirsteen Sullivan), for Dudley (Sonia Kumar), for Dartford (Jim Dickson), for Mid Cheshire (Andrew Cooper) and for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket (Peter Prinsley).
On the Opposition Benches, we heard from the right hon. Member for Wetherby and Easingwold (Sir Alec Shelbrooke), who I have to say looks so healthy as a consequence of the medication he is taking. I remember what he looked like before—he is a shadow of his former self. We also heard from the hon. Members for Newbury (Mr Dillon), for Chester South and Eddisbury (Aphra Brandreth), for Caerfyrddin (Ann Davies), for Honiton and Sidmouth (Richard Foord), for Lagan Valley (Sorcha Eastwood), for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Stratford-on-Avon (Manuela Perteghella), and then obviously from the Opposition spokespeople for the Liberal Democrats and the official Opposition.
The United Kingdom has an obesity crisis. It poses serious challenges to our health, adds preventable pressure on the NHS, and restricts our economic productivity. I am reassured that none of us in the Chamber today underestimates the scale or importance of the task ahead, and we all recognise the need for action. I am proud that this Labour Government have already acted on manifesto commitments in several key areas, as I will outline, but I am also aware that much more needs to be done.
Over two thirds of adults are living with excess weight, and around 36% of children are living with obesity or are overweight by the time they leave primary school. That is appalling, but while it is shocking by itself, that average hides the deep inequalities we see in obesity. Children living in poorer areas are more than twice as likely to be living with obesity than those living in the least deprived areas. That has a huge impact on our lives, increasing the risk of many serious diseases—as we have heard—as well as exacerbating mental health issues and reducing the years that we and our loved ones can expect to live in good health. Almost 22% of all working-age people are economically inactive, and much of that is due to long-term health conditions caused or exacerbated by obesity. The cost of obesity-related conditions to the NHS now stands at £11.4 billion a year, and the cost to wider society is a staggering £74 billion every year.
I am so proud that we are committed to raising the healthiest generation of children ever. That means going further on prevention and tackling the drivers of obesity. Over recent decades in the UK, food and drink that is calorie dense, nutrient poor and less healthy has become cheaper. It is vital that we ensure our policies continue to drive companies to make food and drink healthier. That is why this Government took action to uprate the soft drinks industry levy in the October Budget. That levy has already taken thousands of tonnes of sugar out of the drinks we consume every day, and I give credit to George Osborne, the Conservative Chancellor in the coalition Government, who introduced that measure. Uprating the levy is a key part of keeping it effective and continuing to drive reformulation towards healthier products.
However, this is not just about what is in our food and drinks; less healthy foods are more heavily promoted, marketed and advertised than ever before. One third of the food industry’s advertising budget is spent on marketing confectionery, snacks, desserts and soft drinks, while only around 1% of that budget is spent on marketing fruit and vegetables. It is therefore not a surprise that our children want to eat those products. One study estimated that 6.4% of UK childhood obesity is attributable to junk food TV advertising. That is why this Government have already met our manifesto commitment to lay the secondary legislation required to ensure the ban on junk food ads targeting our kids comes in from October this year. This includes a 9 pm TV watershed for the advertising of less healthy food and drink products, and a restriction on paid-for online advertising of all these products.