This page gives details, updated quarterly about the organisation and running of the Good Food for Our Money campaign, and the contacts we are making to build support.
Winter 2010/2011
In June 2010, Joan Walley MP introduced the ‘Public Bodies (Sustainable Food) Bill’ to parliament after we secured her support in the Private Members’ Bill ballot. The Bill proposed the introduction of health and sustainability standards for public sector food that would become mandatory over time and its second reading was set for 12 November 2010. This was a key date because it is at this stage when Private Members’ Bills either stand or fall, depending on the amount of support they receive from MPs.
To move to the next parliamentary stage, we needed 100 supportive MPs to be present in the House of Commons for the Bill’s second reading. Our work leading up to 12 November focussed on building as much support as possible for the Bill in government and securing commitments from MPs to be present for the Bill’s debate.
We set up a ‘take action’ page on the campaign website so that people could write to their MPs to request that they attended the second reading of the Bill. With the help of many of our campaign supporting organisations, 1,000 people wrote to their MP using the campaign ‘take action’ page. In addition, WWF and Compassion in World Farming both set up ‘take action’ pages on their websites and encouraged thousands of their supporters to write to their MP.
We also organised a party on 11 November – the night before the second reading – to keep MPs in Westminster ahead of the debate the following day. In the week before the second reading, the Labour party gave its official support for the Bill. This was crucial to encouraging Labour MPs to attend the second reading and is a first step in securing Labour party support for the campaign.
Unfortunately the Bill did not receive its second reading because, in spite of our combined efforts, only 62 supportive MPs were present – just 38 short of the total we needed! Although this was a disappointment, we did very well to get 62 MPs to attend on a Friday when, typically, MPs return to their constituencies. While the Bill is now unlikely to progress in this form, it has been helpful in generating support for the campaign.
Since the second reading, the coalition government has published proposals to introduce ‘Government Buying Standards’ which would introduce mandatory standards for all food bought by central government. We have received a draft of the standards and information about how they will be introduced. We are concerned that (1) the standards are weak, and (2) they will affect only central government, which comprises barely a third of public sector food and excludes important public institutions like hospitals!
We have launched a campaign to toughen these standards and to demand that they are then extended to all of the public sector. To do this, Levi Roots is heading a new ‘take action’ page so that people can write to their MP to demand that Food Minister Jim Paice changes the current proposals. More details can be found at www.sustainweb.org/goodfoodforourmoney/take_action/
Spring 2011
In December 2010, Defra published proposals to introduce compulsory Government Buying Standards (GBS) for food bought by central government. GBS will apply to food bought by government departments, prisons and the armed forces, and extend to approximately only one-third of all public sector organisations in England. At present, the proposals require that just 60% of seafood bought by these organisations has to be “sustainable”.
This standard is unacceptably weak and is published at a time of growing public awareness about the sustainability of seafood and the plight of many fish stocks. We have been running a campaign which calls on Defra to change this standard so that 100% of seafood bought by central government is required meet the Olympic definition of seafood sustainability (see http://bit.ly/6XAMRO). Although we are still awaiting publication of GBS, we are told that Defra finalised its proposals at the end of March. Up to this time, we organised a lively seafood campaign which included:
- Highlighting that the seafood standard in GBS is weaker than the standards in pet food served to Larry the No.10 cat. This is because Whiskas and Sheba, which are manufactured by the multi-national organisation Mars Group, contain 100% Marine Stewardship Council certified seafood.
- Setting up online action which enabled people to email Food Minister Jim Paice MP and Defra officials to demand that they change their seafood proposals. In total, approximately 1,200 people have taken online action since the beginning of March.
- Organising a post card campaign in Jim Paice’s constituency.
- Sending cheques for 83p (from staff members who volunteered to use their personal accounts) to the Prime Minister and to each of the other twenty eight Cabinet members, stating that this would cover the cost of serving sustainable seafood at cabinet meetings (our cost calculations used Defra’s own figures). You can read the responses so far received at http://bit.ly/hIwLOz
- Meeting with Jim Paice at Defra (armed with packets of cat food containing sustainable fish) and Willie Bain MP – Labour Party Shadow Food Minister This latter has already led to some useful developments – for example, he has asked a number of parliamentary questions about public sector food since we met.
- Supporting Joan Walley MP in her tabling of Early Day Motion 1452 which calls on the Government to extend Government Buying Standards to all of the public sector, not just parts of it.
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Submitting a detailed response (and thanks to the campaign supporters who contributed) to Defra’s consultation about Government Buying Standards in February. To read our final submission, see http://bit.ly/gfH3v8
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