16/12/2012 Sunday Politics South


16/12/2012

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In the south: riding food costs are not just for Christmas. They also

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Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2140 seconds

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mean poorer households are cutting Welcome to Sunday Politics South.

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My name's Peter Henley. Coming up in the next 20 minutes: the cost of

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Christmas lunch is on the up, you can blame the sprouts for that -

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but are cash-strapped households cutting back on healthier foods as

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the prices rise? We need to talk about Brussels - not the capital of

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Belgium, that's up later - but And lots about Maria Miller in the

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papers this week. These are events from a few years back. Have the

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papers got it in for her? There is a lot of stuff about never send

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around at the moment. Mariette is a fantastic minister. She has an

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awful lot of respect in Parliament. It will take a while for all of

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this to come back but it is a tough It used to be called the Ministry

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of Fun. Equality has been added to it as well. It is important there

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is someone in the Cabinet performing that role as appropriate

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that person should be a woman. The Prime Minister has not performed

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that well in terms of promoting Hopefully Maria will get a clean

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bill of health and we will get to a position where we can look at how

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MPs' expenses are being handled because the cost of regulating the

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system is almost as much as the amount of expenses that MPs are

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entitled to claim. What she has been accused of is from a long time

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ago. Maria is doing a great job. That is the most important thing.

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Now we need to talk about Brussels. Not the capital of Belgium but

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sprouts. Tradionally hated by children everywhere on Christmas

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Day, but now well on their way to becoming a luxury food. In the last

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year the average price of a kilo of sprouts has gone up by 24%, and in

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the same 12 months potatoes are up by 40%, and even the Christmas pud

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is 15% more expensive. It's not just the cost of your Christmas

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fare that's a problem. According to the government's annual Family Food

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Survey out this week lower income families are buying a third less

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fruit and a fifth less veg than five years ago. Joining me now is

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Richard Tiffin, Director of the Centre for Food Security at Reading

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University. It is pretty rapid change some of these price rises.

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Is it making a big impact in the way people behave? Yes, people are

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making decisions about the kind of food they can consume and we are

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seeing a lot less fruit and vegetables being consumed and that

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is worrying. Those price changes significantly affecting the

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healthiness of people's diet. of it is a crop failure but there

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is a short-term thing but the long- term thing is it will be more

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expensive. There are a number of different factors causing that.

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They raised climate change of meaning that yields are more

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susceptible to extreme events, flooding, drought. There is

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increased demand in the developing countries globally which is meaning

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that people are consuming more food there, creating greater competition

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for food globally and driving prices up as a result and there is

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increased linkages between the food market and the energy market so

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energy it is a major component of food production. Also now we grow a

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lot of crops for energy production.. A certain amount of agricultural

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production has to go towards the production of a fuels. There is

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some arguing that some providing those fuel mandates provide

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insurance against... If they can be flexible. In Britain are the only

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having a small issue with this compared to developing countries.

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Absolutely. There is a great contention to worry about these

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small changes in price that are affecting us but we have to

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recognise that on average the UK average consumer spends 11 % of

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their income on food. Even the poorest Spence 70 % on their -- of

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their income. In the developing world, that is more than 60 %. The

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source of price rises have a severe impact on those sorts of countries.

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It is Christmas time, Christmas parties will be rocking to the

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sound of today know it is Christmas. 20 years since the Live Aid event

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we still have a building people undernourished and hungry and

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tragedies like the food crisis in the so hell are unfolding as we

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speak. Jim, with your DEFRA hat on here, this is a serious problem for

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the world in general but it is a serious issue for us as well. We

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are wasting so much food in this country. It is a massive issue.

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Prude affordability internationally is something that will destabilise

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