Last week the Welsh Government announced they were going to ban certain items from meal deals and limit where supermarkets can display treats. This is all in an attempt to combat Wales’ incredibly high obesity rate. You can read more about the plans here.
The announcement led to outrage and fury in some quarters. Conservative Secretary of State for Wales David TC Davies has repeatedly called the plans a “ban on meal deals” (though he is now rather dramatically calling it a ban on meals deals “as we know it”), sharing videos of himself sitting in front of a packet of ready salted crisps and a protein shake because he had “been to the gym today” #Gains.
Having had a few days to digest the policy (excuse the pun) it is pretty clear to me that this is a really sensible move by the Welsh Government and I will try to express here why I believe this to be the case.
Firstly, I should say that as a journalist, it does feel a bit icky to compliment any politician and I want to be clear, just because I think this is a really good policy doesn’t mean I think that everything the Welsh Government does is good (trying to pre-empt the angry commenters here). Just because restricting BOGOF offers on biscuits is a good idea to help relieve pressure on the NHS doesn’t mean that there aren’t massive shortcomings on how for example the Welsh Government handled Covid, Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board or mammoth waiting lists. It also doesn’t mean that they should have a free pass for receiving a taxpayer subsidised full English in the Senedd canteen either.
Right now those disclaimers are out of the way let me explain why this policy is actually a very good one. And the first thing we need to do is look at the problem we are trying to fix.
Why obesity needs to be tackled
In Wales two thirds of men have a weight defined as overweight or obese. In women the figure is 56% of women and 27% of children. In poorer areas the levels are pretty mind blowing. In Blaenau Gwent 79.9% of adults are overweight or obese (a BMI over 25), in Merthyr 77% and in Bridgend 71.2%. Even in the Vale of Glamorgan, which has the lowest rates in Wales, the figure is 56%.
What is the cost of this both in terms of lives and misery? Over half of the children born in 2020 in the UK will experience diet related ill health by the time they are 65 years old. High BMI is the largest identified contributor to the amount of years people live with disability in Wales.
In financial terms it creates a monstrous cost. Illnesses associated with obesity are projected to cost the Welsh NHS more than £465 million per year by 2050, with a cost to society and the economy of £2.4 billion.
There is so much data on the financial and human cost of obesity in Wales that I could go on for ages but suffice to say that this is not an issue we can afford NOT to tackle. So this begs the next question…
Will the Welsh Government‘s plans have a positive effect?
So we know that obesity has to be tackled but will the proposals work. The evidence backing this up is a resounding yes (I will hyper link to research as I go through). There is a reason why Cancer Research UK, Diabetes UK, the Royal College of Physicians, Welsh NHS Confederation and the British Heart Foundation (among many others) all back this plan.
Let’s take the plan to restrict offers and the plan to limit product placement separately. First off, the ban on price promotions of unhealthy food including restricting what can be in a meal deal.
Volume based promotions drive greater sales and promote quick consumption rather than sensible stockpiling. The public accept this. Polling by Cancer Research UK found that 86% of Welsh adults felt that multi-buy type promotions caused people to buy more unhealthy food and that Welsh adults more frequently saw unhealthy food on promotion than healthy food or core staples
They are correct. Other research from Cancer Research UK which included a sample size of 800 Welsh adults found that almost 30% of food and drink in Welsh shopping baskets is bought on promotion. The study found that people who bought more on promotion were more likely to be overweight, and that they were more likely to buy unhealthy food and less likely to buy fruit and vegetables.
Now I know what you are thinking here. We are in the middle of a cost of living crisis, is this really the best time to be making it more expensive for people to buy food? A fair question to ask, although the irony is that many of the politicians loudly shouting this argument are the ones whose decisions have directly caused the cost of living crisis in the first place. But putting that aside there is actually evidence that these promotions actually hurt rather than help people’s finances.
For example, the Food Foundation has pointed to the UK Government's own research which suggests price promotions do not save consumers money and in fact items bought on promotion are usually unplanned purchases causing each household to spend an additional 22% on average – roughly over an extra £700 per household, per year.
There is also the point that the majority of these price promotions are not on core staples of people’s diets. Market data shows 33.9% of price promotions are on biscuits and 36.1% are on confectionery. Moving these promotions away from sweet treats and towards everyday staple items would likely be more beneficial to the wallets of the poorest in Wales.
The other thing the Welsh Government wants to restrict is unhealthy foods being placed near checkouts, on the end of aisles and in aisle bins. This might seem a small thing but it has a massive impact. Impulse purchasing represents a pretty crazy 45% and 70% of food purchases (evidence here, here, and here). Research by the University of Cambridge found that restrictions on the promotion of sweets and confectionery at checkouts led to an immediate 17% reduction in purchases.
Are there better options?
So we know there is an obesity crisis and that the Welsh Government needs to do something about it. We know that these measures will help tackle it. But is there a better option?
The first thing to say is that the Welsh Government isn’t alone in doing this. England already restricts unhealthy product placement around tills. It also intends to to impose restrictions on price promotions (minus meal deals) but has delayed this measure at present.
I have heard several people talk about how it is not really the government’s place to get involved in this. That the focus should be on educating individuals to make an informed choice. But there are issues with this, namely that it takes far more time. The crisis is happening now and at a stroke this legislation will make an immediate difference (especially when spread over an entire nation). Plus, take areas like the Vale of Glamorgan or Monmouthshire. These are the most affluent places in Wales with some of the highest levels of education and yet still more than half of the people there are overweight or obese.
Plus governments have done this for years. We are rehashing many of the same arguments here that we did when we spoke about banning smoking in pubs or banning cigarette adverts of branding of a fag packet. It is, in my view, a perfectly proportionate response to a huge public health crisis.
Human beings are quite bad at making proactive decisions. Take gambling. Tony Blair’s Labour government passed the Gambling Act 2005, dramatically liberalising the laws governing betting, with the pioneer of the legislation Tessa Jowell later describing it as one of her biggest regrets. Now there has been an explosion of gambling addiction leaving a string of broken lives (and a million CEOs) in its wake.
It is all very well to talk about educating people and informing them but when you are dealing with something highly stimulating and addictive like gambling or sugary snacks, using logic is often far less effective than simply limiting accessibility.
There are other sensible elements to this legislation. For example, retailers are allowed to reduce prices on products within 48 hours of going out of date to reduce food waste. It also only hits large retailers, so it won’t harm smaller businesses.
There are lot of reasons to be angry with how the Welsh Government manages healthcare in Wales, but this isn’t it.
