Food for thought

If the phrase ‘I’m so hungry I could eat a horse’ seems to have fallen out of fashion in recent times it is probably because quite a few people unwittingly did.

The horsemeat scandal led to a closer examination of the supply chain – turning the source of our food into a political issue – and with the creation of Food Services Scotland, a non-ministerial body tasked with regulating the food and drink industry and improving nutrition, the food and drink industry has now re-entered parliament.

The food sector is important to Scotland and at least where MSPs are concerned, discussions are evidence-led. Public Health Minister Michael Matheson opened the debate.

He said: “Food-borne diseases cost Scotland £140 million per year. Most significantly, of the 130,000 consumers who contract food-borne diseases each year, around 2,000 will be hospitalised and around 50 will die.”

He told the Chamber: “The public cost of dealing with obesity could rise to £3 billion per year by 2030, so even relatively minor improvements to the safety and standards of food in Scotland will have significant social and economic benefits.”

But if Matheson was keen to strike up a hard headed examination of the facts before the establishment of Food Services Scotland, he may have been disappointed.

Put simply, things got very strange very quickly. In fact the debate seemed to bring out the best in the chamber, with each member bringing their own unique, expert knowledge of the food sector to the table.

SNP MSP Stewart Stevenson, for example, told the story of the time he threw an onion in a fire and then ate it.

He said: “I started my cooking career without a single implement of any kind: I threw an onion into a fire. I waited until it was really charred, then fished it out, peeled off all the burnt bits and was left with a semi-cooked onion that I could chew on. That was really very good for you, if not very good for your love life, but there we are. I can see looks of horror from members around the chamber.”

It is, at times, hard to imagine where Scotland would be without this sort of wisdom.

It is not clear what answers Keir managed to get from interrogating a dead fish about its nationality and background

It started with Labour MSP Duncan McNeil – a member of the Health and Sport Committee – reminding the chamber that “the topics of food, animal feed and fish factories are not the normal bread and butter of our committee. That is my first pun—it is not the last, I am afraid.”

He went on to announce that “the new food body is very much the meat in the sandwich.”

Things went on in that manner, before Christian Allard’s powerhouse intervention.

Allard has worked in the food and drink sector for 30 years and he has been French even longer. When he talks about food, the Chamber listens.

“I do not yet feel ready to speak about diet and obesity, as I have not followed the First Minister’s advice to moderate my food intake, so I will pass and let other members talk about the subject. The only comment that I will make is that, in the main, the problem that we are struggling to cope with is the quantity of food that some of us are eating.”

But if every member seems to have insight into the industry, Stevenson’s seemed the most unique, choosing the moment to reveal that he regularly travels the globe to hunt down fraudulent food stuffs, like some sort of gourmet Indiana Jones.

He said: “I have seen the trade in second-hand Johnnie Walker bottles in India and Coke bottles being refilled in a back street in Hebron in the west bank. Major brands attract fraud around the world."

Bob Doris proceeded to tell Stevenson: “I reassure the member that, since I got married around two and half years ago, there have certainly been fewer recyclable Johnnie Walker bottles lying about my house—that is for sure.”

There was no immediate explanation for why Doris brought this up, but before any questions could be asked SNP MSP Colin Keir was emphasising the importance of knowing where food comes from.

He said: “As someone who, as members can imagine, has been no stranger to a fish supper over the years – perhaps I should stop eating them – I started to ask questions. Where does this fish come from? How is it identified and tracked? How do we ensure that it is quality food?”

It is not clear what answers Keir managed to get from interrogating a dead fish about its nationality and background – maybe he had been drinking Doris’s Johnny Walker (if it is indeed Johnny Walker – and not Buckfast cut with apple juice, planted by one of Stevenson’s suspects in downtown Kabul).

Fortunately Stevenson was soon back on his feet, though by this point it was hard to escape the conclusion that his travel stories were deteriorating.

“I can go to my supermarket – I can go to any supermarket in these islands – and buy a ready meal that has been produced in Fraserburgh to high standards. I can eat haddocks that have come from Peterhead, and I can eat excellent beef, lamb and other meats.”

But if boasting ‘I can go to the supermarket’ seems more in-keeping with a five year old at a dinner party, Stevenson didn’t give the chamber time to notice.

He continued his bizarre story: “For tonight’s tea, I will have a boiled egg from a chicken that is kept in an Edinburgh garden.”

He then emphasised that the egg was not stolen, “A friend gave me the egg two nights ago.”

No one asked.

But – unbelievably – he was not finished: “Once, as a very young lad, I was so attracted to the Victoria plums growing in our garden that the doctor had to be called because I had turned a rather delicate shade of purple—the plums were found to be the cause.”

By this point what had started out as a serious interrogation into one of Scotland’s most important sectors had descended into a group of people trying to get in a word between Stevenson’s ramblings.

As Roderick Campbell put it: “It is always a difficult job to follow Mr Stevenson.” That was true in more ways than one.

And though the debate will no doubt continue, the public may feel safer knowing that food safety will be in the hands of Food Services Scotland and not Scotland’s elected members.