Calls for new tax to turn 'food industry on its head'

Fast food is often cheaper and easy to prepare than healthy dishes

An MP is calling for tougher restrictions, including a new tax on fast food, to "turn the industry on its head".

The government has already pledged to ban advertising of junk food to children before 21:00 GMT, which is set to come into force in October.

But Dr Simon Opher, Stroud's MP, said MPs "need to go further". He wants to see the creation of a new tax on food with high salt and sugar.

"The trouble with unhealthy foods is that they tend to be a lot cheaper and easier to prepare. A lot of working parents will just grab that to make life easier," he added.

Dr Opher, who is also a practicing GP, said previous attempts to tackle obesity are "not working".

"There has been 700 policies around obesity since 1990 and yet obesity has doubled in rates since that time. We need to introduce some mandatory rules for the food industry," he said.

The Department of Health and Social Care is currently developing a new 10-year health plan, which will include ways to cut obesity levels in children and adults.

Dr Simon Opher said previous policies to tackle obesity weren't working

He wants to see healthy food be easier to access by making it cheaper.

"We need to turn the food industry on its head," he added.

Dr Opher is due to lead a debate on the issue in Parliament on Monday afternoon and said the government need to "think in a more radical way".

He said if a new tax was introduced, supermarkets would have to change the way they make foods.

"I would like to see a reformulation tax to make fast foods healthier. It's a bit like the sugar tax on soft drinks. All the companies are now making much lower sugar drinks.

"Money that you get from that [the tax] could be used to provide cheap healthy food for less well off people," he added.

The MP has also been working with organisations that are already promoting healthy eating.

The Square Food Foundation charity in Bristol runs cookery classes to show people how to avoid unhealthy food.

Lucy Dodd, cookery teacher, said: "We can teach people how to use fresh ingredients, to cook from scratch, do batch cooking and make diets healthier."

The project is encouraging people to grow their own veg and salad

Meanwhile, We Are Project Grow works with families in Gloucester and Cheltenham to encourage them to grow their own vegetables.

Claire Dovey, from the project, said in areas with extreme poverty "the levels of obesity are going to be much more prevalent".

"We're coming from bottom up and we're going to change the landscape here," she said.