The Food Standards Agency as a regulator

On the day that the FSA came into existence in 2000, I announced a number of initiatives that were already underway and that would be completed early in the life of the Agency.

Prominent among these were the finalisation of the Framework Agreement between the Agency and local authorities and the introduction of butcher's licensing.

We got off to a very good start in our relationship by completing both of these according to plan.

Since then, specific discussions of local authority work have been held in well over half [19] of all our Board meetings over the past four-and-a-half years.

And it's probably fair to say that most other issues discussed by the Board have some impact on local authorities.

The wide range of topics we have covered range from the reporting, monitoring and auditing under the framework agreement to the recruitment and retention of enforcement officers.

And then there have been important consumer concerns such as the illegal recycling of condemned meat into the human food chain, bulking up of chicken with up to 50% water, improving the checks on imports, local food initiatives, farmer's markets, education, and so on.

Rather than reflect on all of these, I'd like to pick out a few examples of where, from my perspective, our joint working has gone exceptionally well, and a few where we have been able to learn lessons for the future.

Let me start off with a recent success story.

As a result of the foot and mouth outbreak, the government announced that it was going to tighten up checks on imported food. Although we will never know how the virus got into the UK, some experts think that the epidemic might have started as a result of illegally imported meat.

There were two main parts to the new initiative:

Customs and Excise were given the job of improving the checks on personal baggage at airports -the monkeys in the suitcases that make for good stories in the tabloids.

The Food Standards Agency, together with local authorities and port health authorities, was asked to deliver a 'step change' in the controls on imported food - at ports and airports, and right across the country.

The government was clear that unless we showed substantial improvements in the first year, then the responsibilities would be taken away from local authorities and given to a new agency.

In May this year, I reported back to the Cabinet Committee for imports. The government accepted that together, we had achieved a step change, supported by an additional £600,000 for local authorities from the FSA.

We now have better targeting, more sampling, new training, more bangs per buck. This is a real success, and it shows how we can work effectively together for public benefit. But the story has not ended yet, and we must continue to deliver the results expected of us in the coming years.

I have dwelt on imports in some detail because it shows to me how our relationship should be working.

But let me also briefly refer to two other success stories.

Two years ago, the LGA and LACORS, together with the FSA, decided to develop a statement, called Food Vision, which describes our joint aim of improving the food lives of people at the local community level.

In January this year we jointly launched the Food Vision website in Leamington Spa.

The site is, in effect, a directory and guide to examples of successful local food projects, so that others wanting to start up similar work can easily learn from those who have been there and got the T-shirt.

I have visited a number of local food projects in the last four-and-a-half years, as have many other FSA Board members. We've all been impressed with the way in which these projects can make a real difference to the lives of some of the most disadvantaged in our society.

Yesterday, at the FSA's Board meeting, I announced that we are establishing an annual £10,000 prize for a local food project, named in memory of Sheila McKechnie, former Director of the Consumers Association and a champion of the disadvantaged.

In a quite different mode, we have worked effectively together to clamp down on illegal meat scams in which chicken destined for the pet food trade has been recycled into the human food chain.

The FSA's role in this was to support the local enforcement officers and police by providing funding and helping to trace the complex supply chain. To tackle future scams we have set up and funded an illegal meat task force. Wherever there is money to be made legitimately there are also crooks, and our joint responsibility to the public is to make it as hard as possible for the crooks to prosper.

I would not be giving an honest picture of our relationship if I did not counterbalance these and, I have to say, many other success stories by a frank acknowledgement that the FSA and the Local Authorities have 'had their moments.' In fact they have sometimes seemed more like days or weeks than moments!

Much of the early tension arose from the Framework Agreement and the need for you to report to us on your enforcement work and our responsibility for auditing you.

I know from my university career how those of us in the trenches doing the 'real work' of teaching and research felt intensely irritated by what we saw as pen-pushing bureaucrats in central administration, always conjuring new ideas for reporting and monitoring. So I have some sympathy for those who are irked by our requirements.

As I see it, and I may have only picked up part of the story, in the early days, the difficulties from your side arose in part from the mechanics of filling out the electronic returns and the amount of data required, and in part from the FSA¿s policy of openness (sometimes referred to as 'naming and shaming;). From our side, the problems have been the lack of reliable data delivered on time from some local authorities.

Both the FSA and local authorities share the same aim of protecting the public by consistent and high standards of enforcement.

Many authorities are doing an excellent job, but there is scope for better co-operation between us to bring the standards of all up to those of the best. I think we are now moving on together from our early teething troubles and that, in the future, the FSA reports will be seen as being more about celebration of success than about naming and shaming.

I'ts worth mentioning at this point that the report of a recent visit by the European Commission's Food and Veterinary Office commends local authorities and the FSA on their work in relation to enforcement of food hygiene regulations. So the view from out there is that between us we are already doing a good job. It's just that we aspire to do even better.

I now want to turn to the future and highlight three developments that will be important to both the FSA and local authorities.

First, the FSA is in the final stages of preparing a new five-year Strategic Plan. The plan builds on our work in the first four-and-a-half years and many of the work streams and targets will be natural developments of our work so far.

The feedback I have had from you is that the contribution of local authorities is not adequately expressed in the consultation draft. I apologise if this is how it came across and we will adjust the wording in the final draft. We know that what we want to achieve in the plan can only be done if we work effectively with others, particularly local authorities.

For us, it is therefore crucial that we are able to persuade you of the benefits to the public and the appropriateness of our objectives.

And the plan does contain a number (some might say too many) of specific measurable targets, some of which are very stretching.

We are going have three main themes: food safety, eating for health and consumer choice. There is a shift in emphasis in our planned work, to put more effort into the 'eating for health' area. You have said that you support this.

We have already made an impact with two major eating for health initiatives: persuading the food industry to lower salt levels in manufactured food and making a major series of recommendations to government on the promotion of food to children.

With salt, we are on a long journey to reduce the average intake of adults from 9.5g per day to 6g, which our scientific experts recommend. The first steps are taking us in the right direction but there is still a long way to go.

One way that local authorities can help is with procurement. Last year The Minister for Public Health and I wrote to those involved in catering procurement to ask for lower salt levels to be part of the spec for the processed foods and meals.

At yesterday's open meeting, the FSA Board agreed a wide-ranging package of measures to change the environment in which children and parents make food choices. Our recommendations encompass schools, restaurants and shops, as well as TV advertising. We will be monitoring their uptake over the next two years.

Our new Strategic Plan also includes a section on sustainability, which we think should underpin all our work, and which again, links closely with the work of local authorities.

Moving onto my second development for the future, I want to just say a few words about the Government review started by Sir Phillip Hampton [just made Chairman of Sainsbury's] of the relationship between central Government and regulators on the one hand and local authorities on the other.

I know from my conversation with Sir Phillip that one of his themes will be how different regulators can be more effective in working together with local authorities.

We are keen to do what we can to improve our co-ordination with others, and we are already, in advance of whatever the review may recommend, working with the Environment Agency and the Health and Safety Executive towards this end.

My third topic for the future is the introduction, from January 2006, by the European Commission, of new food hygiene requirements for all food businesses. To bring this about is going to be a real challenge for both the FSA and enforcement officers.

For our part, we are investing heavily in developing straightforward guidance, under the heading of 'Safer Food, Better Business' that is going to be suitable for even the smallest food outlet.

The 300,000 catering outlets in the UK, many very small, with unskilled staff and a high turnover are what we are primarily aiming at.

We want our guidance to be helpful to enforcement officers in their role of helping businesses to comply. When I have been out on the beat with environmental health officers, I have been truly in awe of their tact and communication skills when it comes to advising and coaching people on how to comply with the law.

I personally don't think we as an Agency have done enough to recognise this educative role in the way we report on local authority performance, and I know we are working to put this right.

This is also the point at which to emphasise our shared concern about the future supply of skilled and trained EHOs and TSOs, so essential for the future.

In the last part of my talk this afternoon I want to share with you some of our thinking about regulation ahead of a consultation paper we are planning for the autumn.

First let me set the scene.

The overall mood within government is to favour light touch regulation and to minimise the burdens on industry. You will have seen this, for instance, in the Chancellor's budget speech.

The FSA, while it does regulate food products, premises and processes, was primarily set up as a public protection body.

This means, if there is a conflict between the interests of business and of consumers, we would act to protect consumers. But this does not make us automatically unsympathetic to business, because very often the interests of the two groups are aligned, and also we are required to act proportionately.

When it comes to regulation in the strict sense, more than 90% of our legislation come from Brussels. So, while we might be able to influence things at the formative stage, once the regulations are defined, our job is to help to implement them.

However, in recent times, those who think about the nature of regulation have begun to ask whether or not guidance, voluntary codes of practice, and even the publishing of brand names and comparative surveys are, in effect, forms of regulation. There are, however, others who see these as alternatives to regulation.

So where does that leave the FSA? To take one obvious instance, we have a statutory duty to provide the public with information. When this involves brand names and surveys, some will interpret it as back door regulation.

More generally, we have started to identify the questions we need to ask ourselves about our approach. Here are a few:

The Board of the Agency discusses and decides on policy in public, but does this guarantee that those who are affected by our decisions understand how they were made?

Are we consistent in our approach? Are we sure that we apply the same criteria of consumer protection when we have a relatively weak evidence base and when the evidence is much firmer? I don't think that the notion of a fixed level of risk for all actions works, partly because that implies we can assess the risks precisely and partly because it assumes that the public always accepts the same level of risk, which is patently untrue.

Are we proportionate? We are required to consider costs and benefits before taking action, but how should we fulfil this requirement when the risks are uncertain and the costs are impossible to calculate? Should we attempt the cost benefit analysis for all our actions, including, for instance, comparative surveys and guidance, as well as for regulations?

How do wide is our consumer protection remit? According to The Food Standards Act we are required not only to protect public health, but also otherwise protect the interests of consumers, in relation to food. What are the limits of this role? Does it mean supporting the view of consumers as voiced by pressure groups on issues such as pesticides in food or GM, or does it mean sticking with the scientific evidence?

I am not going to try to answer these and other questions about our regulatory role here and now. But I do think that the FSA should be prepared to benchmark itself, and to ensure that it performs alongside the best. So I would certainly like to hear your feedback on how you think we are doing.