Bringing cake into offices as harmful as passive smoking, food watchdog boss suggests

Professor Susan Jebb said people can help each other by providing a 'supportive environment', ITV News' Ben Chapman reports

The head of a food watchdog has appeared to suggest people should not bring cake into the office for the sake of their colleagues’ health as she seemed to liken sharing treats to passive smoking.

Professor Susan Jebb, chairwoman of the Food Standards Agency, also lamented that the advertising of junk food is “undermining people’s free will”. She said while it is a choice to eat sweet treats - as it was a choice to enter "smoky pubs" - people can help each other by providing a “supportive environment”.

She told The Times: “We all like to think we’re rational, intelligent, educated people who make informed choices the whole time, and we undervalue the impact of the environment.

“If nobody brought cakes into the office, I would not eat cakes in the day, but because people do bring cakes in, I eat them.

"Now, OK, I have made a choice, but people were making a choice to go into a smoky pub. “With smoking, after a very long time we have got to a place where we understand that individuals have to make some effort but that we can make their efforts more successful by having a supportive environment. “We still don’t feel like that about food.”

Asked about the professor's comments this morning, Shadow Attorney General Emily Thornberry MP laughed: "Better not stop bringing cake into my office, that's all I can say".

'I think that cake is one of the joys of life. I don't think it should be banned from offices,' Labour MP Emily Thornberry said

Rishi Sunak does not agree with the head of a food watchdog’s suggestion that people should not bring cake into the office for the sake of their colleagues’ health, Downing Street has said. Asked whether the Prime Minister thinks that doing so equates with passive smoking, his official spokesman said: “No. The Prime Minister believes that personal choice should be baked into our approach. “We want to encourage healthy lifestyles and are taking action to tackle obesity, which has cost the NHS £6 billion annually. “However, the way to deal with this issue is not to stop people from occasionally bringing in treats for their co-workers.” Mr Sunak’s press secretary added that he is “very partial to a piece of cake” and most enjoys carrot and red velvet cake.

The Times reported Professor Susan Jebb insisted restrictions on junk food adverts were “not about the nanny state” but would instead tackle what she described as a “complete market failure” where sweet goods take precedence over vegetables.

She told the paper: “The businesses with the most money have the biggest influence on people’s behaviour.

"That’s not fair…we’ve ended up with a complete market failure, because what you get advertised is chocolate and not cauliflower.”

Successive governments have failed to introduce a long-promised ban on pre-watershed TV advertising for junk food, with Rishi Sunak’s new administration announcing in December that the anti-obesity measure will not come into force until 2025.

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