6. DARIEN FENTON (Labour) Link to this
to the Minister of Health
Has he received any reports of community initiatives that have helped in the fight against obesity and contributed to better health outcomes?
Hon PETE HODGSON (Minister of Health) Link to this
Yes, I have. Last week the Mangere Healthy Kai initiative won the supreme Health Innovation Award. Shopkeepers in Māngere have got together to promote and improve sales of healthy food, and to raise awareness for adopting healthy lifestyles. It works. The good people of Māngere have taken to sushi, filled roll sales have doubled, banana sales have trebled, and so on. We should congratulate all those involved.
Has the Minister seen any reports of initiatives that will not contribute to better health outcomes?
I am afraid I have, too. The National Party’s secret plan to let the market set the price for seeing a doctor would drive many people away from getting health advice. John Key and his friends think it is OK for something like health to be a market commodity. This is a little at odds with ordinary Kiwis, who are now going to see their general practitioners more often because it is half the price it used to be. It is also at odds with community initiatives like the Mangere Healthy Kai one, which relies on partnership and goodwill rather more than on venal motives.
Sue KedgleyDoes the Minister agree that, valuable though community initiatives like the one he mentioned are, they will not be sufficient as long as we have an environment in which unhealthy food is far more readily available, is often cheaper, and is far more heavily promoted than healthy food, and that we will not change that environment without putting controls over the marketing of unhealthy foods to children?
Certainly, the marketing of food for children is part of the thinking within the original Healthy Eating - Healthy Action strategy, and I notice that it is also part of the thinking of the report into obesity that has just come from the Health Committee, which the member who asked the question chairs. So, yes, this issue runs across the whole of society, and it will require multiple areas of endeavour to make progress on it. On the other hand, where a small, successful initiative has done so well, I think we should applaud it and give it some congratulations.