MPs say government must tackle obesity epidemic and ‘stand up to the food industry’
A parliamentary committee wants front-of-pack labelling made mandatory, with fast food outlets stopped from opening near schools
MPs have urged the government to “stand up” to the food industry after decades of failure to tackle obesity, costing the country tens of billions a year.
The Health and Social Care Committee have pushed for several proposals to change the food environment in England.
These include suggestions to ban outdoor advertising of junk food, and make front-of-pack labelling mandatory.
The committee say their proposals aim to fix an environment that pushes consumers towards high fat, sugar and salt (HFSS) products, which are typically cheaper than nutritious food.
Proposals include mandatory reporting and targets for supermarkets, backed up with penalties, on the amount of healthy food they sell.
MPs also suggested new planning policies to prevent fast food outlets from opening near schools, and improvements to the NHS’s Healthy Start cards, given to pregnant women and parents of young children to buy fruit and vegetables.
Health and Social Care Committee chairwoman Layla Moran said: “When we say the ‘food environment’, we mean the constant bombardment of promotions and adverts we see and hear in our daily lives – on our screens, on children’s journeys home from school, as we set foot in shops and queue for the checkout.
“The central message of this report is that we need to tackle England’s escalating obesity crisis through prevention.
“That means bearing down on environmental factors that push people to eat unhealthily, that coerce struggling families to buy their children products that fill them up without nourishing them.
“That is why the Government’s food policy needs an overhaul. Perversely, the worst options are the cheapest while the healthiest are harder to access.
“Attitudes of obesity being purely down to the individual failings are outdated and deny the reality of those living with obesity and excess weight in this country needs robust challenge.”
“While we acknowledge the costs of policy changes to the food industry, these are marginal compared to the huge costs of inaction on obesity to society, the economy and the health service.
“The real cost is measured in how many people suffer preventable diseases linked to being overweight or malnourished."
In 2024, 30% of adults in England were living with obesity, a further 36% were overweight, and 28% of children aged 13 to 15 were overweight or obese, according to NHS England.
Obesity costs the UK £74.3 billion per year, including £11.4 billion to the NHS, according to research by Frontier Economics cited by the Department of Health and Social Care.
Between August 2024 and July 2025, nearly £680 million was spent on advertising food and soft drinks through TV, radio and outdoors.
Products such as sweets, chocolates and crisps accounted for 29% of that spending, while fruit and vegetables accounted for 3%, the committee’s report said.