Each year the government spends more than £2 billion on food served in the public sector - schools, hospitals, care homes and the armed forces - which is not required to meet any standards. As a result, the food served is often bad for our health, bad for the environment and bad for the local economy.
Sustain is leading The Good Food for Our Money campaign calling on government to introduce mandatory health, animal welfare, ethical and environmental standards for public sector food.
Due to Sustain’s campaign a ’ Public Bodies (Sustainable Food) Bill’ has been introduced by Joan Walley MP and will receive its second reading on 12th November. The Bill would require government to establish a ‘Code for Sustainable Food’ which all public sector institutions would have to adopt. The Code would include mandatory health, environmental and ethical standards which food served by public sector institutions would have to meet. More details about the Bill and how it will work are available on the campaign website: www.sustainweb.org/goodfoodforourmoney/
Joan Walley has also tabled Early Day Motion (EDM) 530 in Parliament which calls on the government to introduce legal standards for public sector food and endorses the Public Bodies (Sustainable Food) Bill. The EDM has already been signed by 49 MPs and Sustain is expecting this number to increase when MPs return to Parliament after the summer recess.
To read Early Day Motion 530 please click here: http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=41483
The Campaign for Greener Healthcare is one of the supporters of the Public Bodies Sustainable Food Bill and we would really appreciate your help with the Early Day Motion 530 – both to write to MPs and also to spread the word.
The Good Food for Our Money Campaign has set up a user-friendly ‘take action’ page on Sustain’s website. This enables individuals and your organisations’ membership and supporters to send a message to their MP to ask them to sign EDM 530 about public sector food and attend the second reading of the Public Bodies (Sustainable Food) Bill on 12 November.
Please go to www.sustainweb.org/goodfoodforourmoney/
And promote this action to all your colleagues, members and supporters.
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