Oliver blasts 'insult' to dinner ladies

Oliver hit back after Andrew Lansley said there had been a drop in the number of children eating school dinners following the chef's drive to improve nutrition among young people.

The chef said Mr Lansley's comments were "an insult" to thousands of people who had worked hard to give children good meals.

Mr Lansley told doctors at the British Medical Association (BMA) conference in Brighton yesterday there must be an evidence-based approach to dealing with public health issues like food and obesity.

He said people needed to take responsibility for their own health, with the support of government.

"If we are constantly lecturing people and trying to tell them what to do, we will actually find that we undermine and are counterproductive in the results that we achieve," he said.

Oliver's approach to school food had not had the desired effect – the number of children eating school meals had gone down instead of going up, he said.

Mr Lansley said: "Jamie Oliver, quite rightly, was talking about trying to improve the diet of children in schools and improving school meals, but the net effect was the number of children eating school meals in many of these places didn't go up, it went down.

"So then the schools said, it's OK to bring packed lunches but we've got to determine what's in the packed lunches.

"To which the parents' response was that they gave children money, and children are actually spending more money outside school, buying snacks in local shops, instead of on school lunches."

He said people next said shops near schools must be banned.

"Actually, where do we end up with this?" he asked.

Mr Lansley said nothing would work unless people's behaviour changed.

"We've got to understand this is a behaviour-change programme we're engaged in and if behaviour doesn't change, the likelihood is we will fail."

Oliver triggered a national debate about the quality of school food in 2005 when he attacked Turkey Twizzlers. Yesterday he said he was "not encouraged" by Mr Lansley's comments.

He said: "I'm not encouraged by the news that the new Health Secretary has summed up eight years of hard work in a few lines for the sake of a headline.

"To say School Dinners hasn't worked is not just inaccurate but is also an insult to the hard work of hundreds of thousands of dinner ladies, teachers, headteachers and parent helpers who strive to feed schoolkids a nutritious, hot meal for 190 days of the year. Any problems that

we've been having in school meals is more often than not down to continuing lack of funds for training of school catering staff.

"But although the Minister has simplified the school dinners situation for an easy headline, he is right in one respect.

"Yes, people need government support to make key lifestyle changes to improve public health.

"What better way to show support than to invest in education so that all children can have compulsory cooking lessons and all adults can have access to a food centre which teaches core cooking skills and how to cook fresh, tasty, affordable and nutritious food?"

He said said he wanted to see "practical measures to help bring down the spiralling cost to the NHS of obesity and its related diseases – 7bn a year at the moment."

He added: "I'll post him (Mr Lansley) a copy of the School Dinners series, as he's clearly never seen it.

"Moreover, I hope that we can meet soon so I can hear more about his practical ideas for ensuring this generation of children doesn't die earlier than their parents."