Official Report 548KB pdf
09:15
The second item on our agenda is to take evidence from a panel of witnesses on the work of Food Standards Scotland and the first national good food nation plan, which was published in December last year. I welcome to the committee Professor Mary Brennan, director of the living good food nation lab at the University of Edinburgh; Heather Kelman, chair of Food Standards Scotland; and Geoff Ogle, Food Standards Scotland’s chief executive.
We will move straight to questions, starting with David Torrance.
Good morning. To what extent has Food Standards Scotland achieved its stated outcomes and statutory objectives over the life of its previous strategy?
That is a good opening question. We have been incredibly busy over the period of our previous strategy. As people are aware, we went through a few changes with Covid and so on, but we have managed to do most of the things that we had intended to do.
We have progressed with building up our public health nutrition response, understanding a lot more about diet and putting lots of monitoring and evaluation in place so that we can watch where we are going with those things. We have kept our Scottish food crime and incidents unit going, investigating lots of incidents, and we managed to get a couple of successful prosecutions of people who had failed to follow food law.
We have also built up our ability to answer the things that used to be dealt with by the European Food Safety Authority. When we left the European Union, all the assessment of new products, new foods and novel foods was being done in Europe. That had to be brought back into the United Kingdom and set up between us and the Food Standards Agency in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The process was set up from scratch and launched, and it has been used to approve products. That has not happened as quickly as we would like, but it is a very intensive programme for one country, whereas we were previously sharing that workload with a team. It has been a bit challenging.
What have I missed, Geoff? I think that I have missed a chunk.
Under the previous strategy, we made good advances in developing digital data capability. For example, we used to take about six months to produce a report on shellfish; it now takes about six minutes. We have done quite a lot around that sort of delivery in terms of data and digital.
The other thing that we have had to do—which I think we have done quite successfully during the period—is deal with the financial situation that we have been left with. Throughout that strategy period, we pretty much had a flat budget. The level of efficiency challenge has been pretty significant during that time.
Without repeating everything that Heather Kelman has said, I would say that we have done pretty well against the strategic outcomes that we set out.
You know where I am going now. Could you describe and explain the mission and outcomes of the new strategy? How was the new strategy developed, and how has your outlook on the role and remit of Food Standards Scotland changed over the past five years?
Everything that we do in the strategy is drawn from the Food (Scotland) Act 2015. This time, because of the tightness of our resources, we have gone back to first principles and looked at what our functions are, as defined in law. That is where we have taken our strategy from: we have gone back to the original purpose of FSS and tried to strip out anything that is not absolutely directed at those priority areas.
We are a public health body, and we are very proud of the fact that the whole point of Food Standards Scotland is to protect the public from harms associated with food. That was where we came from, in relation to previous food safety incidents. We are very proud of that, and our responsibilities for public health and protecting the health of Scotland will always be at the forefront, whether that is in the short term, in protecting people from initial harms from food, or in our public health and nutrition leadership role, which involves trying to improve the food environment to protect people from the harms caused by eating the wrong diet.
Do you want to talk about the food safety element, Geoff?
The World Health Organization produced a strategy that set out the criteria for an effective food safety authority, and we did an assessment against that as an independent measure of what a successful food safety authority should look like. Our starting point was to consider where we were against that—we did pretty well against it—and building up from that. We used that as a basis to develop our thinking.
Another important point is that the first strategy was knocked out by Brexit and the second strategy was affected by Covid. This time, therefore, we have deliberately built into the strategy as much flexibility and agility as we can. The one thing that we have learned from the other strategies is that what we do is influenced by a lot of external factors that we cannot necessarily shape or influence, but which we have to respond to. For example, the sanitary and phytosanitary—SPS—work that we are having to do just now relates to a UK Government decision that is supported by the Scottish Government. Given its impact on food law, we cannot say, “That work is not in our strategy or plans and so we are not going to do it.” We have had to be deliberately flexible this time.
Our final principle is about public service reform and demonstrating that, over the next period, we will do everything that we can to make sure that the public service delivered in Scotland is efficient and effective, and that our big transformational programme, which is the Scottish authority food enforcement re-build—SAFER programme—is a major contributor to that.
This is my final question. What particular challenges does your organisation face over the next five years?
I will start with the immediate challenges. The SPS agreement that we are going into with Europe will give us a huge challenge, as the 1,300 pieces of legislation that we have prepared over the past while now have to be closely reviewed again to identify those areas where we have differentiated a little bit from Europe. That will require a number of instruments to be brought back, so I suspect that this committee will also be challenged by that in the months ahead. That challenge is really difficult. We have estimated that we will need anything up to 30 members of staff to help us with that work, given the timetable against which we are likely to be expected to deliver. We have already done internal restructuring with the aim of releasing staff to work on identifying the differentiation between ourselves and Europe, and we have begun doing that work.
The second big challenge relates to our SAFER programme, through which we are looking at the challenges that have been presented across Scotland by the reduction in environmental health capacity in local authorities alongside the need to still deliver an effective food law enforcement system. We are looking at data, digital analysis and intelligence and trying to modernise the whole system, which we estimate will take us about five years in total. We have started that work and have set the ball rolling on it. That will be a huge transformational programme.
Our programme board has 30-odd members on it, because we have to have representatives from Government, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, local authorities, industry and so on. It is a big transformational change programme, but it is very exciting. I think that Scotland will reap the benefits of it, with both internal and external standards being demonstrated to be better.
There is also a budget challenge, as is happening in every part of Scottish public sector life. We are very grateful for the additional funding that we have in next year’s budget, but it will still be less than what we have spent this year by about £1 million. We therefore have a challenge in relation to finance, but we are working closely with the Government to see what can be done as we try to deliver our legal functions while having new challenges coming at us. We also still have to keep balanced books at the end of the day and try not to stress our workforce too much by overworking them.
Post-election, regardless of the result or the make-up of the Parliament, a serious question needs to be asked about public health—dietary health—and what needs to be done to fix it. It is clear that, whatever the solutions are, the problems cannot be fixed in one parliamentary session. We are talking about a 10 or 15-year cycle, which will naturally involve more than one parliamentary session.
When it comes to dietary health, last year, we published our “Dietary Intake in Scotland’s Children (DISH) research report”, which represented a serious wake-up call regarding children’s diets in Scotland. Has change happened? Yes. Has it been fast enough? No. There is a real question about the pace of change when it comes to dietary health and FSS’s role in monitoring progress and pushing an agenda that says that we really need to get very serious about addressing public health and dietary health in Scotland.”
Thank you. I have no further questions.
Good morning. There is a sum of £4.4 million to support local authorities, health boards and the newly established Scottish Food Commission. What is the total administrative cost of the commission?
We are not the Food Commission. Mary Brennan may know.
I am here primarily in my University of Edinburgh capacity. However, as I believe the committee is aware, I am one of the commissioners appointed to the Scottish Food Commission.
The arrangements for and details on the Scottish Food Commission’s budget are still being finalised and confirmed between the chair and our new chief executive, who started on 5 January, so we are in the very early stages of the allocation for the Scottish Food Commission. In particular, how support is to go to relevant authorities to support the work of good food nation planning and the local aspect of such planning is still to be confirmed.
It is not great that we do not have clear monetary figures. What modelling—
I can certainly come back to you on that. As I explained, I was invited primarily in my University of Edinburgh capacity rather than as a Scottish food commissioner. However, I will go back to our chair and chief executive and we will send in a written statement.
Thank you. I will just stay with you, Professor Brennan. What modelling has been done on the cumulative regulatory impact on small Scottish food producers?
By the Scottish Food Commission?
By anyone.
Do you mean the cumulative effect of regulation?
Yes.
I have not been involved in that through the living good food nation lab, and it is certainly not something that has been undertaken by the Scottish Food Commission, as of yet.
There is a balance between the burden of regulation, the flexibility and agility that are provided to food businesses and the responsibility of those businesses to support our country’s food safety, public health and environmental ambitions. We therefore have to be very careful about framing regulation as a burden on businesses. Regulation is there to support businesses to operate in a way that ensures safe, sustainable and fair conditions for the public and for those organisations.
Are you saying that we do not have safe, sustainable and fair conditions for businesses?
Of course we have. That is where regulation, legislation and policy play a role, as their use provides us with confidence and enforcement mechanisms to ensure that our food is safe, healthy and sustainable.
Are you saying that it is those things now?
Yes.
What safeguards are in place for rural economies—in particular, for livestock farmers?
At the heart of the Good Food Nation (Scotland) Act 2022 and other legislation is a vision of better connection across the various outcome areas. Those outcome areas are differentially weighted in relation to the various actors within the system. They matter to them in different ways and are of more interest to them in different ways. As a result, we have to be extremely cognisant of the impact that new legislation might have, but we also have to be aware of what we are trying to achieve through that legislation.
09:30
Rural and island communities are very much at the forefront of our thinking, certainly in the living good food nation lab. We are actively engaging with island and rural relevant authorities, as we are with all our relevant authorities, to understand and meet them where they are currently. Through that engagement, we help and support them to understand what the Good Food Nation (Scotland) Act 2022 and the requirement to undertake and produce good food nation plans mean for them, and how they can use the legislation in a way that enables them to better understand what food means to them and how that relates to the outcomes that are laid out in the act. The relevant authorities—both local authorities and health boards—have flexibility at that level to enable them to understand how they relate to those outcomes, what makes them distinctive and what their priorities are, and how to take forward their good food nation vision in their local communities and regions.
Staying on that subject, when do you envisage that section 10 will be commenced?
I can answer that—vaguely. It is my understanding that section 10 is likely to be commenced, or that a decision will be made on section 10—I say this from the perspective of my position at the University of Edinburgh and the interactions that I have with the Scottish Government good food nation team—in advance of the beginning of the pre-election period.
To add to that, I suppose that when you look at the regulatory burden, it depends on which lens you are looking through. Counterparts such as David Thomson of the Food and Drink Federation Scotland talk about the cumulative effect of regulation on businesses across a spectrum, whether in food safety, environmental or whatever. The cumulative effect of regulation across Government affects business.
From our perspective, we do not default to regulation as the answer. A good example is that, when we were looking at changes to allergens recently, we were quite clear that regulation at this stage was not the answer. There are certain areas where we think that regulation would be appropriate, but we are conscious that, to be able to put in place regulation, you have to be able to say that it is justifiable, and then you have to undertake business and regulatory impact assessments and those sorts of things.
We are conscious of the cumulative burden of regulation on businesses, but, at the same time, from our perspective, we are looking at what the best mechanism is to protect public health. That will be the primary driver, and the default is not to say that regulation is the answer to a particular question.
My question was very much centred around modelling. Losing businesses as a result of bringing in regulations would be even worse for our health.
I turn to my final question. Of the 51 high-level indicators, what would you say are the core couple of indicators?
Do you mean the indicators in the good food nation plan?
Yes.
Food Standards Scotland has provided a number of routes by which the indicators can be measured, and both our food science team and our nutrition team have done the work to look at that. They have pulled out the indicators that matter most for our remit around health, children’s health and food safety, because good food nation legislation should require food to be safe as well as healthy and of good quality. We have contributed what we feel are the best, most robust indicators. The survey that we do jointly with the Food Standards Agency every two years will gather that data from the public, as will the surveys that we do within the Scottish health survey in every period when it comes round.
We developed Intake24 so that we can look in far more detail at people’s diets, including children’s diets, for the first time, and we will be able to monitor the diets of children and adults throughout the period to see whether we are actually having an impact on change.
I do not know whether that quite answers the question.
It is very important to appreciate why there are 51 indicators. I am not saying that they are necessarily all equally weighted, but the national good food nation plan presents a very complicated systems vision across multiple outcome areas that have huge quantities of scientific evidence underpinning each of them. While 51 may seem a lot, therefore, it is about identifying the range of, and the connection and relationship within and between, those indicators and across the outcomes.
That is why I was asking about the core ones.
I am, therefore, very reticent to say that there are some indicators that are more important than others.
Forgive me—I did not say, “more important”; I asked what the core indicators were.
I think that those 51 are the core indicators, arising from the way in which the process has been undertaken and the final—and now published—first national good food nation plan has been consulted on and scrutinised. I believe that a consensus or position has been reached, with which the community of practice is in agreement, that helps us to understand the direction of travel, the progress that is being made and whether we are moving collectively towards delivering a good food nation for Scotland.
In my view, part of the question is about what the starting point is. Given what I said earlier, I would say that, with regard to our responsibilities around public health, the indicators on children’s health should be the primary focus. That is the trajectory that we can actually do something about, and we now have the evidence on the nutritional state of children’s diets and the information on levels of obesity in children right the way through from primary 1.
To go back to what I said earlier, there is an opportunity to say that we can start a journey and monitor and measure to see whether progress is being made, and in my view, that would involve the indicators around children’s health.
The data matters, but the ways of working, and the partnership and collaboration, across the relevant authorities and public agencies, within Government and across Parliament, are also central to the success and the driving forward of those key outcome areas and the underpinning indicators.
Good morning to youse all. I want to pick up on the issues around regulations and business with regard to the good food nation plan. It is the first such plan. When the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health was before the committee previously, she said that it will change and evolve as science and nutritional advice, and evidence and research, allow us to make and recommend changes.
Public health is a huge concern for me, given the levels of obesity, and childhood obesity, in Scotland. We heard from Dave Thomson of the Food and Drink Federation about where calories have been removed from products. Members all know of my interest in ultra-processed food and ultra-high-processed food—calorie-dense food that is manufactured to be hyperpalatable so that people will consume 1,000 calories before they even think about being satiated.
I would like to hear comments from you about the good food nation plan and how it helps us to focus on the complexity of the food system in order to support the public health approach, with a balance that supports business as well.
That is a really good point. I reread the good food nation plan; the bits that we have an impact on are obviously the elements to do with food safety and leading on public health and nutrition. However, what I like about the plan is that it goes beyond that to look at ensuring that rural communities are well supported and that people working in the sector have a decent wage, so that we are building an infrastructure that reflects all aspects of public health and food businesses. That is important—it is not just about the food on our plate; it is about the environment that we live in.
There are some clear targets in the plan on children’s nutrition, free school meals, improving education on nutrition in schools and that type of thing. However, some are far more generic and relate to income and people’s ability to live and to choose to eat a more healthy diet. We know that choosing to eat a less ultra-processed diet is more expensive than choosing to eat one that is easily available and easy to cook and prepare. We cannot do without UPF completely, but we believe that this is a start towards encouraging people to re-engage with fresh food and food that they can grow within communities.
There is quite a depth to it. There is a reason why it is not just us; a whole host of other agencies and departments across Government take into account the environment that people live in and the work and educational experiences that they have. It is a true public health approach, which looks at all the pillars of good public health. We have the opportunity to work across local authorities, health boards, industry and primary producers to consider what we as a nation produce, put on our shelves and, ultimately, eat.
Other things are also weaving in from what is happening in the UK food strategy and in relation to the healthier food standard that is being introduced. I am pleased that that is being talked about on a four-nations basis, because industry cannot really work in just one of the four nations. That will give us a chance to monitor what is being sold and provided to people in terms of health balance across the width of a diet.
I hope that, with all those individual actions coming together, we will start to see momentum back towards people eating fresher and more sating foods that will better nourish our bodies and look after our children.
As part of all of that, we need to make sure that people are not living in food deserts where they do not have access to food that they can cook quickly and easily. It all intermingles with the cost of living crisis, when it also costs money to turn on the gas burner and cook a meal and all of that. For me, part of the good food nation plan—this is the first plan—is about starting to raise awareness and work together to look at what we can do to shift and address issues such as childhood obesity.
One of the things that I am excited about is how, through the next period, as relevant authorities engage in developing their local good food nation plans, we can get into the detail about what that means in different localities and regions across Scotland; how we can begin to understand where the common ground is and where we can operate collectively but also what we might need to understand in terms of different geographies and socioeconomic demographics and the different working practices and lifestyle options that people have.
Through the local good food nation plans, we will get a chapter from every part of Scotland that tells us why food matters to it and how, specifically, that relates to dietary and public health, but also tells us about the tensions around how high-processed and ultra-processed food has become so much a part of our everyday food provisioning practices—I include myself in that—and how we feed ourselves.
Do you want to move on to the next theme, Ms Harper?
Aye, sure, if we are already there. I am glad that these witnesses are here today, because I have a great interest in this subject. I have previously raised issues about the Nova classification and Carlos Monteiro’s work in São Paulo in Brazil in relation to how we define ultra-high-processed food, or ultra-processed food, as it is more commonly known. When that work was done—in, I think, 2019—the evidence included that reducing salt, fat and sugar was the way to go, because ultra-high-processed food contains high fat, sugar and salt.
I would be interested in hearing about any recent evidence that supports or refutes the findings of the Nova classification and about what more can be done. I know that there is on-going research, because Nova has been criticised.
Yes, the categories for Nova were criticised because they are very difficult to categorise the food into; it is a very non-scientific definition of food. Some ultra-processed foods are very healthy, but others are not so healthy.
09:45
We have to be mindful of the debate, discussion and emerging research on UPFs—it is in our strategy that we will monitor them throughout the next period. Part of our role is to look at emerging food patterns and trends, so it is in our strategy that we will continue to monitor that.
I read an interesting review recently. Off the top of my head, I cannot remember which magazine it was in, but I will be happy to have it circulated. It said that some bits of Nova are useful but others are still being criticised by the scientific community. I am not completely confident that I can remember the detail, so I will be happy to circulate the paper to you or ask Gillian Purdon, our head of nutrition, to provide an update.
As a social scientist, I think that it is important to note that being able to define ultra-processed foods or ultra-high-processed foods strictly from a scientific perspective does not necessarily give us all the understanding and evidence as to what that means for a societal and/or political and/or policy decision in relation to ultra-processed foods and the trade-offs in and tensions between economic, social, health and environmental factors. Part of the journey forward will be to engage in some of those difficult discussions, tensions and trade-offs and make sense of what they mean and how they relate to Scotland’s ambitions for a good food nation—specifically, for public health and dietary health.
For me, having informed consumers is, in a way, the best mechanism for managing this. It is interesting because, from a public health policy perspective, you can have loads of conversations about whether one classification is right or another is better, whether we should have something else, whether we should change it or whether we should substratify it into 1A, 1B and 1C—you can go for all that—but, at the end of the day, UPFs have helped the debate through your point about high levels of fat, salt and sugar. The strongest public message at the moment is this: if you have a concern about ultra-processed foods, do not eat products that are high in fat, salt or sugar and you will not be eating ultra-processed foods.
We need to do whatever we can to provide clarity and transparency for consumers, but sometimes we just need to be clear about what the advice is—that foods that are high in fat, salt or sugar have very poor nutritional value. We should be telling people, “Don’t eat those. Avoid those foods. They are nutritionally poor and calorie dense and will not help your diet.” Obviously, the debate about classification can go on in the background, but we should not be distracted by saying that, in order to be able to give consumers good advice, we have to redefine the classification. We can do that, but let us not use it as a reason not to give clear messages now.
I have a point to add, which is about fibre. If people could eat more fibre, I would be very happy, because it is such an important part of our diet. Good dietary fibre is missing in UPFs. We are revising the Scottish dietary goals at the moment and are even more keen to see an increase in fibre intake because of the impact that that has on bowel health, which has an impact on mental health and so on. If there is one thing that I would love people to do, it is to eat more vegetables, fruit and wholemeal products.
Geoff Ogle, on the issue of high fat, sugar and salt, are you aware of current research to look at the chemicals that are added—for example, stabilisers, emulsifiers, flavourings and colourings—and how those affect people physically and mentally?
I talk about being satiated or not. Some food additives switch off the brain’s ability to say, “I’m full—I’m done.” People have proposed that some of the chemicals that are added affect our ability to feel satiated.
We are not doing any specific research on that, but it is definitely something that we are aware of in the context of the UPF debate. From our perspective, anything that will be added to food—whether it is an emulsifier, an additive or whatever—must go through a safety assessment, must be risk assessed and must have regulatory approval attached to it before it can be added.
The issue with some of these things is also how the science develops. We would not say, “Once we have done an authorisation, that is it—forget about it and move on.” We monitor the scientific debate. However, I am not aware of there being any strong evidence about additives at this point. I will check with my team on that and come back to you, but I am not currently aware of there being any evidence that is of such clarity that we would need to decide that there are certain things that must be considered again and re-evaluated. There is nothing on my radar to suggest that that is the case.
I will move on to the recommendation to reduce the consumption of red meat and dairy in the Scottish diet. When I looked further, I found that the recommendation was not just to reduce red meat but to reduce red and processed meat—we need to remember that.
I come from a dairy and meat-producing region. The recommendation is to reduce the consumption of red and processed meat to no more than 70g every day, and I believe that two thirds of people in Scotland already do that. We heard about that in the Rural Affairs and Islands Committee when we took evidence on the good food nation plan and the climate change plan. That means that a third of people are consuming more than 70g, but we need to remember that two thirds of Scottish people are consuming less than 70g.
What advice have you given the Government about the recommendation in relation to 70g of red and processed meat, as well as a reduction in dairy? Some kids out there wouldnae get the calcium or micronutrients that they need if they did not have half a pint of milk each day. That is my concern, given that we live in a world with food banks.
We have done a fair bit of research. We were commissioned to have a look at the Climate Change Committee’s recommendation about reducing the consumption of red meat, red processed meat and dairy. We did a lot of research into the nutritional status of the diets of adults and children and the impact that the recommended reductions would have on them.
The conclusion that we reached was that we should not make any change to the recommendation. There is a balance to be struck between making sure that the public has the right nutritional profile in their diet to sustain health and being aware that consumption of more than 70g of red and red processed meat each day contributes to climate emissions. We stuck with our original recommendation with the focus that those who eat more than 70g each day should perhaps come down to that level.
We are currently reviewing the Scottish dietary goals again. It is possible to reduce the consumption of red meat and red processed meat products further while still maintaining a healthy diet, but more effort needs to be put into thinking about the balance of foods that are eaten. It would not be straightforward to say, “We recommend that you reduce red meat to X amount per day, and the balance will be there.” Some people could manage that diet, but there is strong evidence that other people are dependent on those foods for their nutrient intake, especially elements such as iron and selenium.
We can consider the “Eatwell Guide”, which is the recommended diet for the UK. There would be a far greater reduction in emissions if people followed the “Eatwell Guide” and avoided eating foods that are not in the guide. We need to stay focused on encouraging people to follow the “Eatwell Guide” and to try to achieve a dietary balance with more of a focus on fibre, vegetables and fruit and less on highly processed discretionary products that cause emissions to be emitted across the world.
What do you envision Food Standards Scotland’s role to be in helping to support the implementation of the good food nation legislation?
Our main role is to provide the scientific base for public health nutrition, which we have done right from the outset. We will continue to monitor the good evidence that exists about what should be in diets across Scotland, as well as people’s eating habits. We will also, through the Scottish health survey, continue to monitor what people are eating and the contribution that that is making.
We do not actually do the education bit; we have a relationship with Public Health Scotland and an emerging relationship with the Scottish food commission. We will do the work to provide the evidence base, carry out a lot of monitoring, report back on that, ensure that our partners across agencies are aware of what we can do and contribute to any other aspects when we can.
Like you, I am worried about the health of our children and want to ensure that our kids have the healthiest possible start in life. You spoke about being able to look at the diets, and Geoff Ogle spoke about how indicators of children’s health should be our primary focus. What is the projected reduction in childhood obesity by 2030?
I have found that very difficult to identify. One of the problems with the projection to halve childhood obesity by 2030 was that no one organisation or body was made accountable for it. It is hard to find graphs that show where we are. We have levelled out—the rate of increase has steadied—and we saw some changes during Covid, but there is an awful lot of work to do.
If I am totally honest, as an independent lay chair, I do not think that we will halve childhood obesity by 2030. It is too little, too late right now. We have only four years left to do it. That does not excuse us from making the best possible effort to see whether we can have a major impact on children being obese at age five, or on the younger childhood age group. I do not believe that we will halve childhood obesity in that time, and I have not seen any data on current projections of where we will be by 2030.
Thank you.
Good morning. This is my pet topic as well. I want to talk about the food system and population health priorities, which should drive everything that we do in this area. I completely agree with Geoff Ogle about measuring childhood health.
I have a real concern about how the reduction in the consumption of red meat is being discussed and the potential impact on health. I am not even sure what the term “meat” means—you have referred to both “meat” and “processed meat”. Surely we should be reducing the consumption of processed meat rather than the consumption of meat in general. Two thirds of people do not have enough protein in their diet, and I am particularly concerned about young girls, given their need for iron and iodine, which meat provides. Yes, too much red meat is bad for you, but too little is really bad for you as well.
How we discuss the issue concerns me, because we seem to be focused on, as one of my colleagues mentioned, the climate impact, which I also challenge. My fear is that our approach is driving poor diets to become even worse. There must be a better way of discussing the issue.
There is an interconnectedness. Our focus is very much on the dietary impact of the recommendations. You are absolutely right that one of the problems that we have in Scotland is that people’s diets are poor, and the impact on nutritional health from implementing the recommendations was a major factor in shaping our own conclusions and recommendations.
The other factor to consider is the behavioural and social-science aspect. It is all very well to say, “We should cut red meat,” but if you do not take steps that change behaviours at the same time, you do not switch off the demand; you effectively ruin your own supply and industry and end up importing it from elsewhere. It means that, in climate terms, you do not actually make any difference.
Correct.
When you look at where we stand on the Scottish dietary goals and the “Eatwell Guide” plate, the meat category is a good example of that. At a macro level, it looks like we are doing okay, but our conclusion was that, once you look at certain demographics—unfortunately, Brian, we are in that over‑50 male group that significantly overconsumes red meat—
I am, slightly.
—it becomes clear that the overall figure is not uniform and masks how you get to it.
Young and teenage girls definitely underconsume red meat, so it is clear that there are different demographics with different consumption patterns. Our conclusion was that if you have information showing that you are not meeting the Scottish dietary goals, there is much more you can do to deliver against the “Eatwell Guide” plate. If you do that, it will make a significant impact on climate change without needing to change anything else, other than doing what we say should be done.
For us, it is about the need to understand the nutritional consequences of those recommendations. In the end, the health impact specifically was the fact that influenced our recommendations.
10:00
There is a second aspect to the reduction in red meat consumption. Before we started talking about climate change and red meat, we already had a maximum recommended intake, due to the association between red meat consumption and colorectal cancer. That evidence is still there, so we are not saying that people should consume unlimited red meat; that is why we have the maximum daily limit. There remains a clear scientific link between red meat consumption and colorectal cancer, and we cannot ignore that.
If we stay focused on saying that the “Eatwell Guide” represents the best balance that we have regarding what people should eat every day to achieve good public health, good individual nutritional health and positive impacts on climate change, that would be the right balance to strike. We are not removing the recommended maximum limit of 70g, because there is a risk associated with red meat and red meat products, which have been directly linked to colorectal cancer. That is the current limit.
There is always a bit of a judgment with nutrition and diet. There is no such thing as one healthy food—you have to eat a healthy diet. Red meat has a role, particularly for our young, growing population who require iron and the other minerals in red meat to help them to grow to their maximum potential. We are already falling behind the rest of Europe on growth predictions for our young people in Scotland and the UK.
We are kind of agreeing here, I think.
Yes.
It is not the 70g limit that worries me. I go back to Geoff Ogle’s point about those of us who have crept over 50—some of us have crept over 60. I suggest that the people in this room understand diet a lot better than the majority of the population.
I come from a time when, 50 years ago, the standard diet was meat, veg and potatoes, and there was a lot less obesity back then than there is now. I suggest that we are focusing on the wrong thing. We should be focusing on what has happened in the interim—fast food and the increase in salt, sugar and fat—rather than what we have just discussed.
We are going to have an argument about climate change soon, because I do not agree with that either. It is about getting back to the basics of eating what we grow and produce in our country.
It is about eating food for health.
We are very good at producing dairy, beef, root vegetables and fruit. If we can go back to a basic diet, it would solve a lot of the issues.
I agree, but our social scientist here might add something to that. Part of the problem is that we have a food industry that is really pushing snacking, and a culture among young people—
I am very good at snacking as well, by the way.
They are very, very good at it. Young people today are not encouraged to sit down and eat a meal—it is snacking on the go that is recommended. There is an issue with companies trying to grab the nutritional message by promoting high-protein snack bars rather than a meal on a plate.
We have been trying to focus on the food environment and on working closely with industry to try to raise awareness that, in some ways, it has to look to its long-term future. The current approach is not sustainable. If the industry does not want the population dying younger from more diseases, it needs to back down. It cannot promote the expansion and growth of snacks at the cost of people eating a good, healthy diet. I have read the latest “State of Snacking” report by Mondelēz International—it is scary that the industry wants to push these snack products to the point at which we do not eat meals.
In my view, one of the battlegrounds—for those who are playing buzzword bingo—is public procurement. The Good Food Nation (Scotland) Act 2022 and similar pieces of legislation are, or should be, capable of driving change towards, as you said, people sitting down and eating a decent meal. We have, and the 2022 act has, the ability to do that. East Ayrshire Council used to be five star in that regard, but even its approach is now falling away, at a time when we should be pushing that harder.
Where is public procurement in the 2022 act? I will be honest with you: I think that it is falling short of what it could be. It could have been a lot more powerful than it currently is, and I hope that, in the next session of Parliament, it will become so.
Public procurement applies to the education system, the health system and the prison system. Should we be focusing on that?
I am going to look to our colleagues at the Scottish Food Commission on that, because the commission gives us a big opportunity to work with local authorities and public authorities such as health boards to push the procurement side in order to get more fish, meat and so on back on to plates, and to meet the aims of the “Eatwell Guide” through the food that we are procuring in public bodies.
Absolutely. I have been working in this area for many years, and I think that there are huge opportunities, but we have to be cautious. I was reading the committee’s excellent “Report on the Proposed National Good Food Nation Plan”, which was published last September. Although guidance on food procurement practices is important, investment is needed to deliver on that.
At the heart of what I am hoping for—along with the commission more broadly and the work of the living lab—is to be able to better articulate the investment that public food can deliver across those outcome areas. By investing in better, fairer, healthier and more sustainable public food, and in the workers and supply chain in public food, we can ensure that we are delivering across those outcome areas for Scotland—not only in childhood health, but for businesses, our health service and our workforces.
I come back to your point, Mr Whittle, that we cannot overestimate how different our food environment has become since you were growing up, and since I was growing up back in Ireland. I do not want to use the word “unregulated”, because it is not unregulated, but there has been a lot of flexibility for businesses to evolve to become the sort of organisations they are and develop the offerings that they provide. That has completely transformed the way that we think about food and how we incorporate it into our lives, but also how we value food in our day-to-day practices. That includes how we value the school meal and the school lunch time, and how we invest in not only the food and the people, but the space in which that eating takes place.
That is the same in the health service. I am interested in our local authorities and health boards. One of the questions that we have posed to them is about how they really think about food service delivery, which is under their remit, and about how they reimagine and invest in that so that they can support their local economies and communities and lift up the public health and dietary health of their populations. That is hugely important, and I think that they are up for it, but resources and the finances are a major challenge. Public Health Scotland, in its new strategy, talks strongly about trying to prevent future ill health. We really have to think about how we reframe what it is that we are investing in public food and how that can help us to drive forward across our outcomes and transform the Scottish food system.
I agree 100 per cent. Not investing in that is a false economy.
I do not know whether you agree with me, but I consider one of the issues to be the inability to think across portfolios. The cost with regard to education or the cost to a council is not reflected in the additional costs to the health system, nor in the potential cost of not attaining at school
My concern is that we will need to import food unless we change our diet. There is an argument about adding more fish to your diet, which I absolutely agree with, but we are also cutting quotas for fish because we overfish, so there are a lot of tensions. I come back to the point of eating what you can grow locally, because it speaks to food security, and to my concern about reducing red meat consumption, because what we should actually reduce is processed meat consumption.
Increasingly, the discussions about security, sustainability, health and food safety are all interlinked. You cannot talk about one without looking at the other. Security and sustainability are generally the things that catch attention. Safety issues are quite often seen as a given, whereas security and sustainability issues also impact on food safety and health.
On issues such as procurement, you have security of supply. If you do not have that and cannot supply hospitals with food, you have another problem. Those things are all interlinked and work together, but we must consider how we focus on that interlinking. It a bit like splat the rat: you hit something over here, then you have a problem over there.
At FSS, we have been talking about the linkage between all those aspects. We are primarily focused on the safety elements, whereas the Scottish Government leads on security and sustainability, but you cannot look at one without looking at the others—they are all intertwined. We need to get better at making those connections and understanding the consequences. One of the advantages of a good food nation plan is that it requires the Government to look at the impact across the board and across portfolios, which is an opportunity to put focus on food issues higher up the agenda.
There is so much to get into, but I will leave it there.
Good morning. How will the good food nation plan, and the work of Food Standards Scotland align with wider Government strategies on agriculture, food manufacturing and dietary goals, so that production, consumption and emissions reduction are addressed in a consistent policy framework?
This is a bit of a complicated answer. Central to the Good Food Nation (Scotland) Act 2022 are the Good Food Nation (Specified Functions and Descriptions) (Scottish Ministers) Regulations 2025, which is a piece of secondary legislation that is designed to ensure that different policy areas, portfolios and legislation connect with the 2022 act and subsequently the plan, and that they have regard for the plan and document how they do so.
You might be aware that the secondary legislation was withdrawn and is to be reintroduced to the Parliament after it has been revised. Quite a bit of work is still on-going in that area, although the scrutiny process raised a lot of issues about the importance of being able to ensure that not only are portfolio areas aware, but that we also understand the gaps between them, the relationship between them and how the Parliament undertakes scrutiny across multiple committee remits, as well as how the Scottish ministers could work more collaboratively.
10:15
Moreover, the Scottish Food Commission will, I hope, play a significant part in really scrutinising what is going on and, where necessary, highlighting not only good practice, but less than ideal practice or concerns about disconnects between policy areas and the broader vision. After all, we are all, fundamentally, trying to work towards a way of navigating and negotiating all of this, and to find out how we can get this broad suite of policies and legislation pulling in the same direction, while holding in tension the trade-offs and challenges that doing so poses for us scientifically as well as from a policy perspective, politically and socially.
There is a lot going on, but I am confident that the mechanism that is under revision, as well as our approach to the development and design of the Scottish Food Commission’s first strategic plan, has that aim at its centre. I am going to use this opportunity today to make a call to the Parliament and the committees to be as active and engaged as possible with the agenda, so that we can keep the connections between the outcomes and between the areas as strong as the individual outcomes themselves.
On page 16 of our strategy, we outline our annual delivery plans. We have moved away from three-year plans, because it is impossible to make such judgments when you do not know what is coming at you. The section in question, which is entitled
“Navigating a complex operating environment”,
shows that, under this set-up, we will not just report to this committee but try to meet a number of other committees, such as those concerned with the rural and justice portfolios. We are going across a number of areas to link in the bits of intelligence, data and understanding that we have, and to raise awareness of what research is going on. We are also working very closely with Government on the strategic research programme, and we are working with our food institutes across Scotland on new research issues that will help support Scotland in developing a mix of locally grown and sustainable products that will feed our nation in a healthier way. We are trying very hard to navigate that complexity of agreement.
We meet regularly with Public Health Scotland, and now with the Scottish Food Commission, as well as others, including Quality Meat Scotland and the National Farmers Union Scotland. We are just trying to put in place that interlocking Venn diagram, because we all have a role to play, but none of us is an island. We all have to meet the boundaries, to ensure that we are sharing evidence, intelligence, data and monitoring information, and to try to pull together and work towards improving the situation.
Geoff, do you want to add anything?
I just wanted to reinforce the point. On page 4 of our strategy, we say:
“We recognise that the food system is not just about safety and standards—it is also about sustainability, equity and resilience. Our strategy takes full account of the Scottish Government’s ambitions for a Good Food Nation and the transition to Net Zero. We will work to ensure that our policies and actions support a food system that is environmentally responsible, socially just, and capable of adapting to future challenges.”
The other thing that I would add is that, certainly from my perspective as chief executive, we actually have good relationships with the Scottish Government. We maintain our independence, but we also recognise that we need to work with Government, so we have regular airtime with ministers in order to share any issues and concerns that we might have. Equally, though, we will challenge the Government where we think such challenge is appropriate. It is a healthy relationship, with a healthy tension where that is needed.
We have a similar relationship with food businesses and industries across Scotland, too. That is the advantage that Food Standards Scotland gives Scotland over the rest of the UK: by keeping public health, nutrition, food labelling and the food safety and standards element together, we can work right across the whole food chain to try to influence things where we can. We are not always successful, but we try to influence beyond our boundaries.
I am already seeing this happening in the innovative cross-relevant authority groupings that are coming together, but I am 100 per cent confident that, in the development of the national good food nation plan, the hundreds of civil servants involved, including those who led it, have had their thinking about their way of working fundamentally challenged by the journey that they have gone on. Indeed, they have been much more explicit in the final plan about the role of the Scottish Government and the civil servants, who have been so central, and how they have had to evolve their way of working and, to an extent, their way of collaborating and partnering with the wider policy and public agency ecosystem. That hugely valuable outcome of the process of producing a plan is hard to measure, but it is absolutely there.
The committee has covered both in this evidence session and in other sessions how we reduce emissions from food, but there is the other side of the coin—that is, increasingly poor weather, with repeated patterns of flooding and so on. Is there anything in the plan to mitigate those sorts of localised flooding issues and other climate change impacts on the food system here? I very much agree with some of my colleagues about eating locally produced food, but if we continue to see some of these patterns, that will become more difficult. What is there in the plan to ensure that we have that secure system and mitigation if some of these impacts begin to increase?
First, as Geoff Ogle has mentioned, the Scottish Government is responsible for sustainability and food security. However, that does not mean that we are oblivious to it, and we spend a lot of time discussing food security, and food sustainability in particular. Obviously, our strategic research programme has also been looking at that.
That said, it is not something that we drive forward on, and I am not sure whether there are any such elements in the good food nation plan, either.
The issue does not strictly fall within the Scottish Food Commission’s remit, but it is clearly a pillar of the national good food nation plan. What are perhaps more important in this respect are the local good food nation plans, where local authorities, in particular, are able to articulate the impact of climate change on their geographies, their rural businesses and their capacity to produce food securely and consistently. Part of that is about being able to articulate how farming—and, importantly, horticulture—is evolving within local authorities and the impact of climate change in that respect, and it then connects with that wider understanding of how farming, agriculture and crofting are evolving across Scotland.
That work will give us a much better understanding of the impact of climate change on food production, not only from a weather perspective, but from the perspectives of business, security, logistics, infrastructure and the wellbeing of communities. Therefore, it is, in that context, more integrated. However, just as Heather Kelman and Geoff Ogle have been saying, we, too, will work and engage closely with the other agencies and the specialist scientific evidence as it stands. Indeed, we are already beginning to do so.
That is great. Thank you.
I call Elena Whitham.
Good morning. I want to spend a bit of time talking about food processing, food safety and food crime. Is there any synergy between addressing those three issues and the creation of a good food nation, or could any tensions arise as we seek to ensure that we have food safety, address food crime and have safe food processing?
The simple answer to that is that there is a legal responsibility to ensure that food is safe. Regardless of why it is being produced, the bottom-line legal requirement is that food must be safe. Are there any potential risks around food crime and production? For example, if you are obligated to meet certain requirements to certain standards, to a certain time and to a certain volume, and you have problems with supply, you might be tempted to take shortcuts, but that is no different to any kind of production, whether it is in a good food nation context or not. If a business is under stress or financial pressure or whatever, that risk might always exist. I therefore do not think that the good food nation plan of itself adds risk or threat to the food system.
If we look at it in terms of aspects of the discussion about localism and the sourcing of food, it could be argued that it helps in some ways. Global food systems have extensive food supply chains. For example, as a consequence of what has happened to Ukraine in recent years, there has been quite a lot of focus on food security and shortening the supply chain to de-risk supply. In such cases, it could be argued that the good food nation will help to drive that. One way or the other, it does not add to the risk; in some ways, it mitigates it.
You mentioned the shortening of supply chains. We have already heard this morning about localism, and Brian Whittle talked about food security in a local area. Can the good food nation plans start to align with initiatives such as community wealth building? If we think about food processing in a local area, is there a golden thread that could be pulled through all that?
Potentially. As I see it, the risk to local supply is in the sustainability and security of that continuing supply. If you are supplying schools, hospitals, prisons and so on, those organisations will want security of supply—they will want to know that the supply is guaranteed, regardless of whatever it might be. The challenge for localism is whether it can produce the volumes necessary for the communities that it wants to supply, and that depends on the scale of what we are looking to accomplish; that is the one issue that we need to be conscious of around localism. The other issue is about continuing to ensure the safety of the food that is being produced.
Whether the supply is locally secure or not locally secure is not a binary issue. We can go on a journey to increase the proportion of food that is procured locally. When I use the term “local”, I probably mean regional or national, which is quite a contested area. It is not a binary either/or.
Elena Whitham is absolutely right that we are already seeing how relevant authorities are using this planning opportunity to connect with community planning partnerships and community empowerment initiatives in order to address the pinch points that small and medium-sized businesses and/or farmers and producers face in relation to slaughterhouses and local processing, which Geoff Ogle mentioned, and identify the actors in the supply chain—particularly wholesalers—who can help to leverage and consolidate supply from a variety of smaller producers. Through doing that, those actors can increase the proportion of food that is sourced locally, which will have a local economic multiplier effect in local economies by creating jobs, ensuring that money stays in the regions and driving greater economic development activity. Increasing the proportion of locally sourced food would also be good socially, environmentally and from a public health perspective.
10:30
Thank you. That is very helpful.
Let us stick with the issues of food safety and food processing. I was interested to read in the meeting papers that, according to the most recent lab report data that is available, the detection rates for food-borne pathogens have remained static during the past five years. Is there any information about why that is? Is it because we are getting better at detecting those pathogens, or is there still an issue with food processing that has caused the number of pathogens to remain static over the past five years?
I am not absolutely sure why the rates are static, but it is good that they are not increasing and that we know what the rates are. We are concerned about some of the pathogens. It would not be the right wording to say that they are becoming more lethal, but there are some coming out that seem to have a greater effect while still being within safe limits. The systems that we have are pretty comprehensive: food producers and local authorities do a lot of monitoring, and then we do some monitoring on top of that.
Now that we can do genome sequencing, we are starting to look at the one-path thing, to work out where the pathogens are originating from in the food chain or in the environment. That will be an interesting area to watch throughout the period of the next strategy, as we try to better understand where these things are coming into the food chain from and whether we can do more to tackle the root causes rather than constantly put out fires.
However, we have not—I will hold on to the desk—had huge issues in recent years, which is a testament to the work that is being done to keep food safe. Geoff, do you want to add anything?
I can provide a bit more detail. Campylobacter has started to increase again—that comes after a decrease during Covid in the volume of pathogens that cause food-borne illness. There is also an increasing risk from things such as mycotoxins that are linked to the consequences of climate change.
It is an ever-changing picture. Over the past couple of years, there have been some incidents that were related to E coli, and there have been cases of listeria, although there have not been so many cases of salmonella. The pathogens still pop up now and again, but, fortunately, not at a level that would cause significant risk to big populations.
The other thing that is different is that we, the FSA and the food industry have all become much better at using the recall system. It is pretty slick now with regard to the ways in which food can be recalled and quickly taken off shelves. If a recall is issued, a lot of retailers can put a ban on the system so that, if a product is not moved from shelves and someone tries to buy it, the sale can be stopped. There is now more sophistication in how the risk can be controlled, which is helpful.
Is there enough resource in the system to address this ever-evolving situation? How do you feel about the resource?
How do I feel about the resource? The slightly flippant answer is that I would always like to have more money. There will always be a financial challenge. In many ways, that should be the case—we are a public service and we rely on taxpayer funding, so there is an onus on us to be efficient. We are taking a big opportunity to do that by investing as much as we can in data and digital and by using the wealth of information and data that we have available to do analytics and predictions.
We are much better than we were at the beginning of the strategy period at things such as horizon scanning and anticipating where the risks might come from. We are more sophisticated in that now and are better at prevention, so we can spot where a problem might come up and introduce mitigations before the problem arises. That is down to our use of data and digital and being able to be a bit more forensic about where we focus our attention.
I have a couple of questions about food crime. When I was reading the meeting papers again, I was struck by the fact that a lot of food crime is undertaken by people who have legitimate roles in the food industry, which allows them to exploit it. How does FSS approach food crime that is facilitated by or organised within the food industry? Is that a key strand of work that you have on your radar?
We use a series of mechanisms. Our food crime unit has a relatively big intelligence cell for an organisation of our size, so the work is intelligence led. We have an investigation arm and are heavily involved in a Police Scotland group that brings together a number of agencies. We work closely with the Food Industry Intelligence Network, which was set up after the horse meat scandal, and we also work with Crimestoppers to get information. Last year, all the information on the investigation into illicit vodka initially came from Crimestoppers. We also get intelligence from the industry, although I think that there are opportunities for the industry to be a bit more supportive in coming forward with its concerns. Generally, the approach that we take to intelligence gathering and the level of co-operation that we have with other agencies are significant, as collaboration is key in this area.
At the investigation stage, the relationships that we have with the police and the fiscal are really important. Our team fronts up the food crime element, but there is a whole package of work around that. Local authorities are also important, as are staff on the front line, and the information that they provide is really important.
I am part of the cross-party group on food, and we are very aware of the big, important issues, such as the capturing of counterfeit vodka and the court case on the misrepresentation of tea.
You have addressed my next question, which was about collaborative working with the Food Standards Agency and others. What are your future priorities for food crime, and are they aligned with those of the Food Standards Agency?
We produce a joint strategic assessment every three years, I think, which takes a whole-system approach to identifying the risks. For example, illegal meat has been quite high on the list, as has the adulteration of fish. We worked internationally on operation opson, which found massive fraud in the tuna industry that was worth hundreds of millions of pounds.
We conduct an assessment of where we think the risks and threats to the food chain are, including financial risk, which is harder to pin down. It is hard to equate the assumptions that we make with the risks to businesses. For example, X number of businesses might be under financial stress, but how do we identify them and what do we do about it? You have to be quite cautious about not making broad assumptions that are hard to justify.
We are very good at working collaboratively with the FSA, because we know the integration of the supply chain throughout Great Britain. Mutual support for each other has always been offered if it is needed. From my perspective, we are leading the way internationally in relation to that area of food crime. Certainly, we have had a number of visits from other administrations to look at what we are doing in the area.
Thank you. That is helpful.
I will ask some questions about the food hygiene information scheme. There has been a bit of media coverage of the scheme in England, where they have a sticker that goes on the window. Obviously, it relies on the establishment to change that sticker, so that people know whether it is accurate, and I think that they are looking at moving to an online system.
We have an online system, which sounds good on the face of it—until you actually try to use it. You go to the Food Standards Scotland website and it is great. You can put in the name of a specific business or you can put in a street. I have typed in “Canongate” and asked it to tell me which businesses were assessed as having a requirement for improvement; the options are simply “pass” or “improvement required”. There are seven results, which cover a range of different food premises. There is one in particular, which I will not name but which is a pub that I would have eaten in. Edinburgh’s pub food scene is great. The inspection date is given as 4 September 2024. However, what was wrong in September 2024? Is it safe for me to eat there now? The site is meant to be about sharing information.
There is a link to the City of Edinburgh Council’s food safety website, which takes me to a general page that tells me that, if I want specific information, I have to go back to the Food Standards Scotland website. Without emailing the council’s environmental health service, therefore, I do not know whether there is a significant reason why I would not want to eat there, whether it is being fixed or whether several people have had food poisoning.
We have a system that, with modern technology, should work so that people have real choice. I am keen to encourage you to look at how that could be fixed for the future, because it is not an information system just now.
We are aware of that. I will let Geoff Ogle explain.
I knew, from the look that I got from Heather, that I would be answering that question. [Laughter.]
Joe FitzPatrick is right in saying that there are a number of issues. Let me offer assurance on the first point. If there was a safety issue or a threat to public health from any business, the local authority should take the necessary action, right through to enforcement, in order to prevent that business from operating. The FHIS does not undermine the point that, if a business should be closed, it should be closed.
There are difficulties with the FHIS because it is binary; it is a case of either “pass” or “requires improvement”, which does not share much information. The scheme in Wales, Northern Ireland and England is numeric, so there is some scalability, which helps. Consumer information elements are key to our reforms through the safer programme, which Heather talked about earlier. We want to improve consumer transparency, and reform of the FHIS is, in fact, part of that.
The difficulty that we have—which is one of the reasons why we have the safer programme—is the capacity of local authorities. At the moment, the estimate of resource is something like 46 per cent below what local authorities are saying they need, and there is no doubt that that will have an impact. If I am being quite honest, there are issues with the frequency of visits. However, if a business has been assessed as requiring improvement, local authorities should be following that up. The process is that they will go out and do an assessment, say that a business requires improvement and identify where that improvement is required. There should then be a follow-up visit.
If Joe FitzPatrick gives me the details, I can follow the matter up with the relevant local authority. However, the process should be that a “requires improvement” assessment requires follow-up. That is the way that the system is designed.
That is fair enough. However, this is meant to be an information scheme. It is great if it is being looked at, but my point is that, if I have taken the bother to go and look it up, in the short term, I should at least be able to see that information. If I am taking my friends out to eat someplace, I do not want them to get food poisoning. If a particular place has been assessed as requiring improvement, surely I should be able to easily access the report. If a care home has an improvement scheme notice, you can go online and see it. Food Standards Scotland and local authorities should surely be able to work together to get that in place pretty quickly.
Right now, there is no penalty for a business, because customers simply do not know. They do not know whether they are going somewhere that has great hygiene or not-so-great hygiene, and they cannot find out what needs improvement. Maybe it was about a wee mistake or something that was fixed almost immediately, or maybe it was about something like a lack of hand washing, which is significant in terms of passing on the pathogens that we talked about earlier.
I would encourage you to have a look and see whether something can be done soon.
I will take that away and look at it. If the report was asked for under freedom of information rules, it would be hard to refuse it. The business might try to say that it should be refused on commercial grounds; it could be challenged. However, one of our core values is transparency, and there are other aspects of the food chain on which we publish reports. I will take that issue away and look at it.
I thank the panel for their evidence this morning. I will now suspend the meeting to allow for a short break and a changeover of witnesses.
10:46
Meeting suspended.
10:56
On resuming—