Cartoon characters could be banned from junk food

Tony the Tiger and the Dairylea cow could
be banished from shelves under new proposals

One-Minute Read

The proposal is one of several reforms proposed by a cross-party
committee of MPs in a report looking into ways to combat child
obesity.

The ban would apply to both “brand-generated”
advertising mascots, like Tony the Tiger or the Dairylea cow, and
the use of licensed characters from TV or film to promote food
containing high volumes of fat, sugar or salt.

Child-friendly characters associated with
healthy foods, such as the Jolly Green Giant, would be spared the
axe, under the proposals put forward by the Health and Social Care
Select Committee.

A 2010 study found that 50% of children “say that food
from a package decorated with a cartoon celebrity such as Shrek
tastes better than the same exact food from a plain package”,
CNN reported at the time.

The committee also recommended that junk food
advertising be banned from TV screens until after the 9pm
watershed.

Other suggestions in their report include ending multi-buy
promotions on junk food products, and barring supermarkets from
placing sweet shelves by check-outs to encourage impulse buys.

The committee said that the scale of the problem
necessitated a “whole system approach”.

“Children are becoming obese at an earlier age
and staying obese for longer,” said Conservative MP Dr Sarah
Wollaston, who chairs the committee. The problem “can no longer be
ignored”, she added.

Yesterday, it was revealed that more than 22,000 Year Six pupils in England and
Wales are classed as “severely obese”, meaning roughly one in
25 children will start secondary school dangerously overweight.

One-third of children in the UK are overweight
or obese, according to government figures, and health campaigners
have warned of a health “timebomb” that can only be defused if
drastic steps are taken to combat the epidemic.

“The NHS spent £6.1 billion in the last year on
treating conditions related to obesity – more than the combined
budgets for the police, fire service and judicial system,” says
Politics Home.

Dr Modi Mwatsama, of the campaign group Obesity
Health Alliance, described the committee’s recommendations were
“superb”.

“The UK is in the midst of an obesity epidemic
and the Government must take strong measures to tackle childhood
obesity if we’re to prevent this spiralling beyond control,” she
said.