Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture and Food, my friend and colleague, Deputy Brendan Smith, to the House for what is a timely Adjournment motion in light of the excesses in which all of us will inevitably indulge over the Christmas period. I would like to focus specifically on the report of the National Heart Alliance, entitled Position Paper on Marketing of Unhealthy Foods to Children, which was published in November in response to a separate report, entitled The Marketing of Unhealthy Food to Children in Europe, which had been published by the European Heart Network.

As the Minister of State is aware, the National Heart Alliance's report, which covers a wide range of issues, is supported by many regional and national bodies, including Barnardos, the Children's Rights Alliance and various groups involved in dietary matters. In its various sections, the alliance's report includes many recommendations relating to the media, the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland's code of conduct on the advertising of food products, the involvement of parents in the home, child care health services, hospitals, residential facilities, the retail sector, monitoring and data collection. The summary of the report, which makes for stark reading, states that an obesity epidemic is unquestionably waiting to happen in this country. As legislators, it is time for us to wake up to that unpalatable reality.

The time in the not too distant past when obesity was a problem for more affluent countries than Ireland is within living memory. I refer to a time when there was not enough food on many tables to prevent children from being hungry. There was no question of there being enough food to enable youngsters to become obese. There was a different rhythm to life in previous decades, when children took more exercise and spent more time in the open air. That is no longer the case as a result of changing trends, such as improvements in forms of technology like the information superhighway, which we are all now inevitably running on. Those of us who have children are aware that the level of participation in outdoor sports and other forms of physical activity has decreased. More and more couch potatoes are being reared. I genuinely fear for the next generation. All of us recognise the problem that exists, but we need to decide what we will do about it.

The National Heart Alliance has performed a public service in publishing its position paper, which challenges the Government, various Departments, parents and certain State agencies. The report, which makes for very difficult reading, states:

A study by the Green Party in September 2002 showed that 54% of all advertisements targeted at children were for foods high in salt, fat, sugar or a combination of one or more of these. As regards public opinion, a recent survey by the Southern Area of the HSE showed that 75% of parents considered television food advertisements to children usually promote unhealthy foods. In 2004 a national survey, conducted by Safefood Consumer Tracking Research showed that 56% of parents were concerned with the advertising of foods to children.

I would like to focus on the report's recommendations. I agree with the alliance in its acknowledgement that "the Children's Advertising Code of the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland, is a positive first step to provide some restrictions on advertising to children". However, I also agree with the alliance's belief that the code "continues to expose children to the marketing of foods high in fat (specifically saturated and trans fats), sugar and salt; does not take into account the cumulative effect of advertising on children; and does not limit the number of food advertisements per segment or per day". The alliance recognises that "the BCI's proposed evaluation would provide an important opportunity to address the limitations of the code identified above". I hope the Minister of State can have some influence in that regard, even if this matter is not directly related to his mandate.

The alliance's report argues that the Government should support work at European level to:

restrict the claims by some food manufacturers regarding the nutritional profile of their foods, especially those high in fat, salt and sugar. Claims concerning the benefits of certain products may lead consumers to eat too much of something that should make up only a small part of a good diet.

Similarly, the report recommends that the EU should "agree a common definition of unhealthy foods". Those of us who are aware of this problem like to examine the breakdown of the content of various brands of food when we go to the supermarket. However, we often find that full information is not available. It is clear that transparency continues to be a major issue for the food industry. Public opinion recently forced McDonald's to reduce the salt content of a wide variety of its foods, including its French fries. Further analysis recently indicated that the "healthy option" that is offered by McDonald's is far from healthy. I do not want to single out McDonald's, as similar problems are encountered in all fastfood outlets. Such products may be healthy if one eats them once a month, but not on a sustained and regular basis. I do not make any apologies for saying that junk food is bad for one — it is as simple as that. I do not care about the corporate power of certain multinational food organisations, which are able to get away with their actions by using the full force of that power.

The National Heart Alliance's report suggests that "parents need to review and supervise their children's television viewing time", which is very nice in theory but not an easy thing to do. As a parent, I assure the House that it is almost impossible. The report also advises parents "to be aware of the marketing strategies that impact in the home through television, the Internet, texting and product packaging".

Marketing on the Internet is a new form of advertising. We need to be aware that some clever marketing strategies are being employed. It may not be widely known that a strategy called product placement is used within the film industry in Hollywood. Certain products are placed in feature movies so that they are subliminally seen by viewers. Nobody ever asks how they get there — they get there because the companies concerned spend enormous sums of money on ensuring their products are placed on cinema screens, right in front of viewers. I do not doubt that similar activities are taking place in respect of television programming.

The report also contains some recommendations which apply to pre-schools, schools and the non-formal education sector. It states that "the school environment needs to be guided by a health food policy which ensures that healthy food and snacks are provided in schools, for example, meals, tuck shops and vending machines". We all know about the fastfood industry. Crisps are part of the daily diet of many people. I do not want to be critical of anybody in the teaching profession, but I am afraid there is a residual resistance within the profession as a whole to any form of acknowledgement that forms of junk food like crisps do not represent a healthy option for children. I fail to understand why more schools are not accepting the findings of documents like the National Health Alliance's report and ensuring that junk food is not available in school tuck shops.

The alliance's report points out that in the food sector, "most of the money spent on marketing is for television advertisements". It continues:

There are signs that advertising budgets spent on television may be declining slightly, with small but rising proportions being diverted into schools or via the Internet. A variety of creative marketing strategies are used to promote foods to children. These include linking food products with both children's heroes and cartoon characters from films and books; and linking food products with children's products/toys. Spending on media such as magazines, radio, cinema, mobile phones and outdoor advertising is normally a small proportion of total food marketing budgets. However, along with television, schools and the Internet, these media form part of a sophisticated and integrated mix of marketing techniques used by companies to sell their products.

I hope the Minister of State will assure the House and those who are concerned about the growing problem of obesity, especially among young people, that policies are in place to tackle the food companies in a more proactive manner in the marketplace in which they operate. If necessary, taxpayers' money should be spent on combatting and countering the messages which are transmitted on television and cinema screens. There is a need for a Government programme to be specifically targeted at identifying the problems people face. If people are not aware of the risks, the Government, which represents the people, has a duty to provide the relevant information. Taxpayers' money would be very well spent in that way.