Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer has vowed to ban junk food advertising as he declared he is “up for the fight in improving children’s health”.
Addressing critics who called his measures “too nanny state”, the political leader launched a fresh series of proposed measures as part of the party’s new child health crackdown.
Among other measures, Labour has pledged to bring in a 9pm watershed for junk food advertising and to launch free breakfast clubs in primary schools.
Announcing the launch of Labour’s Child Health Action Plan, Starmer added that if his party was voted in power in the next election he would “end the scandal of children being held back by poor health”.
The conservative government delayed a ban on pre-watershed junk food advertising, which was due to come into force in January 2023, until 2025.
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Starmer said: “The biggest casualty of the short term ‘sticking plaster’ politics of the last 14 years are our nation’s children. My Labour government will turn this around. Healthy, happy children is not a nice to have, it’s a basic right, with economic urgency.”
Ahead of a visit to Manchester to address the new plan, Starmer added: “We want to encourage good parenting, but I don’t think we can just turn our back on this.
“We need to take on this question of the nanny state. The moment you do anything on children’s health, people say ‘you’re going down the road of a nanny state’. We want to have that fight.”
