Bad time to withdraw funds from Jamie Oliver-backed Leeds Ministry of Food - The Yorkshire Post says

Just as the Government’s decision to delay parts of its obesity strategy caused Jamie Oliver to stage his ‘Eton mess’ protest outside Downing Street yesterday, a cooking education programme in West Yorkshire which had been backed by the celebrity chef has had funding withdrawn.

The Ministry of Food scheme, which teaches people how to cook healthy and affordable meals in order to address health issues, has been operating in Leeds for the last 12 years but the city council says that the money would be better spent on smoking cessation sessions.

The commitment to dealing with smoking is laudable, however the moment chosen for withdrawing such resources is lamentable.

As Dominic Charkin, the CEO of not-for-profit Zest, says, it “flies in the face of current priorities”.

The decision comes as the Trussell Trust revealed last month that its network provided more than 2.1m parcels to people facing financial hardship across the country, from April 1 2021 to March 31 2022.

Meanwhile, curbs on multi-buy deals in stores and television adverts for junk food before the 9pm watershed have been put on hold for at least a year, with Ministers biding time to assess the impact of the plans on the cost of living crisis.

Former Conservative Party leader Lord Hague branded the U-turn “morally reprehensible”.

Clearly we are in an economic maelstrom which means many projects of great social benefit will have their purse strings snipped, but the health of the country is already under immense pressure – and needs all the help it can get.