§ Lord Clement-Jonesasked Her Majesty's Government:
What progress has been made to date in promoting the use of the National Health Service brand to identify reliable third party sources of information and advice on health-related matters; and whether they have any plans to extend the scheme further so as to include the endorsement of health food and other products; and [HL1136]
What further consideration has been given to the suggestion made by the Chief Medical Officer at the Westminster Diet and Health Forum for the development of a "kite mark" for use on health food and weight management options; and on what basis products would be assessed for inclusion in such a scheme [HL1137]
§ Lord WarnerThe use of the National Health Service brand to identify reliable third party sources of information and advice on health-related matters is36WA currently at pilot stage. As identified in the recent Command Paper Building on the Best; Choice, Responsiveness and Equity in the NHS, "kitemarks" will be piloted on cancer information from the voluntary sector and the NHSA Direct On Line "Information Partner Programme". These pilots are targeted at information only and do not include health food and weight management options.
Rules on the labelling of food are harmonised at Community level. Negotiations are ongoing on a proposal to regulate nutrition and health claims, which seeks to establish a list of approved claims and pre-authorisation of new claims on the advice of the European Food Safety Authority. In addition, the European Commission is due to bring forward proposals to amend the nutrition labelling rules, including mandatory nutrition labelling on all prepackaged foods, and improvements to the presentation of this information to consumers.