Labour says it will require 50% of food bought with the public purse to be produced to higher standards. But recent history suggests we shouldn’t hold our breath. Nick Hughes reports.
At this month’s Oxford Farming Conference, a beleaguered Steve Reed set out a series of pledges to farmers aimed at moving the conversation on from the fury over changes to inheritance tax.
Among these was a commitment to use the government’s substantial purchasing power to back British-grown produce, with “an ambition for 50% of public sector food in hospitals, army bases and prisons to be local or produced to high environmental standards”.
The secretary of state for Defra also promised the government would monitor where food bought by the public sector comes from, “ensuring farmers get a fairer share of the £5bn pounds a year spent on public-sector catering contracts”.
The announcement was part of a package of measures aimed at quelling a rural revolt that has been simmering ever since the autumn budget. While it was unsuccessful in shifting farmer sentiment back in favour of the new government, the proposal could be of major consequence to those producing and supplying our food should it be properly acted upon.
That’s a big ‘if’. Regular Footprint readers will know that bold pronouncements over public food procurement hardly count as news these days. Indeed, Labour’s 50% target has been circling the policy sphere for some time already.
The previous Conservative-led government’s 2022 food strategy included a strikingly similar commitment to “introduce an aspirational target that at least 50% of food spend must be on food produced locally or certified to higher environmental production standards, while maintaining value for money for taxpayers”.
A consultation document was subsequently published in August 2022, yet by the time the 2024 election hove into view it remained unanswered and unacted upon by the government.
Questions abound
There are plenty of unanswered questions too around Labour’s own proposal. For example, it’s not immediately clear whether the 50% target will apply to food purchased across the entire public sector or only to institutions that are already subject to the existing government buying standards for food (GBSF).
In his speech, Reed mentioned by name only “hospitals, army bases and prisons” in the context of the 50% ambition. These, along with central government departments, already fall within the scope of the GBSF, however the bulk of the £5bn spent on public sector food is made up of money spent in institutions that currently sit outside the GBSF, like schools, colleges and local authority care homes. Will these be subject to the new standards? A query lodged with Defra has so far returned no clear answer.
In his speech, Reed also declared how “for the first time, government will now monitor where food bought by the public sector comes from”, suggesting an intention to invest in systems that ensure compliance. However Footprintunderstands the first step is simply for Defra to review where food currently comes from – no mean feat in itself given the number of different catering companies that hold government contracts and the challenge in pulling together robust ingredient data on country of origin and production systems.
These foundational questions require answers before we begin to address the thorny business of how Labour plans to define pliable concepts like ‘local’ and ‘high environmental standards’. In this context, it’s worth reflecting on the Conservative’s own consultation document for clues as to how Labour might frame its 50% target and the guardrails it may seek to build around it.
Grey areas
The headline Conservative proposal was for a minimum requirement that at least 20% of food spend must be on food certified to higher environmental production standards and in total 50% must be spent either on locally produced foods or those certified to higher environmental production standards.
The consultation document defined locally produced food as ingredients produced, grown or caught within the same region as it is consumed, or a neighbouring county. Multi-ingredient foods could qualify as locally produced if at least 50% of the quantity of their ingredients were sourced from the local region.
Higher environmental production standards, meanwhile, were defined as production systems demonstrating integrated farm management of natural habitats and biodiversity; soil management and fertility; prevention and control of pollution; energy, water and waste management; and landscape and nature conservation. In practice, the government said that meant sourcing LEAF certified produce “or equivalent”, or food from organic production systems.
The proposals were largely welcomed by campaigners at the time, although clarity was sought over what key principles, such as equivalence to LEAF standards, would mean in practice. There were similar grey areas concerning commodities where sourcing requirements were for products like palm oil, soy and cocoa to be “demonstrably legal and sustainable” through “certification, or equivalent”.
Other experts expressed concern over the lumping together of local and higher environmental standards as though they were somehow of equivalent value. Prestige Purchasing chair David Read said the 50% target for local and higher standard food had been deployed in a way that suggested the government believed “they deliver broadly the same outcomes, when they most certainly don’t”.
Another review
In the event, the government never responded to its own consultation. Rather than push through the proposals ahead of the 2024 election, the then Defra secretary of state Steve Barclay instead commissioned yet another review. In March last year, Conservative MP Will Quince was tasked with looking at ways to promote high standards for food and catering services and make public sector supply chains more accessible to small-and-medium sized businesses (SMEs) and farmers.
Quince, to his credit, reported back just three months later. As well as calling for the government to respond to its original consultation without delay (it never did), he called for a single set of buying standards to be mandated across the entire public sector, with exemptions where specific nutritional requirements need to be met, and for those standards to be consistently applied and properly enforced.
Quince found that existing standards hadn’t been properly monitored since they were introduced in 2011 meaning there was little evidence of their effectiveness or whether they were even being followed. Although his review found high level awareness of the GBSF, it identified “systemic barriers to compliance” and a “lack of clarity on expectations”, with the picture blurred by “different sets of standards applying to or available across the public sector” – for example, the specific nutritional standards that state-funded schools must adhere to.
The point about the need to enforce whatever standards are ultimately developed is one that is consistently hammered home by campaigners. Responding to Labour’s proposal, which she broadly welcomed, Ruth Westcott, campaign manager at Sustain, said: “We need strong, legally binding standards stipulating agroecological and locally-sourced foods if we’re to genuinely support farmers and bring public sector food in line with our climate targets.”
Like much of Labour’s food policy platform, the direction of travel on public procurement is broadly positive from a sustainability perspective but the detail is fuzzy to say the least. After years of prevarication by successive governments, action to improve the standard of public sector food can’t come quickly enough.
