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Tories predict defeat over new EU rules
Opposition peers are set to defeat the government over EU plans to
regulate vitamin and mineral supplements.
Conservative shadow health minister Earl Howe has warned the House of
Lords is likely to inflict a rare defeat next week over an EU directive on food
supplements.
In an interview with ePolitix.com, the peer explained that the party had decided to champion the issue because of fears that UK jobs will be lost
and people could be forced to shop abroad or on the internet for food
supplements.
Experts estimate that around 5 million people in Britain now take food
supplements and the issue surrounds an EU directive that Brussels argues
is to ensure vitamin and mineral pills are safe to be consumed as supplements
to a normal diet.
Earl Howe rejected the EU's claim: "This is not about safety. It's about
harmonisation and the big boys in Europe having the run of the field to
themselves and squeezing out the specialist manufacturers in this
country."
He accused ministers at the Department of Health of failing to take the
issue seriously.
"My own view is that ministers have not ensured sufficient manpower to
this. It's been a minor sideshow for them. But they've had six years to get
the UK's position across. They really have not exercised themselves at
all on this," he said.
The peer revealed that when the legislation comes before the Lords on Monday,
the Conservatives are confident it will be rejected.
"We will oppose the regulations. I shall be putting down a formal motion.
It will then be up to the House to vote on it and I understand that the
Liberals will vote with us," he said.
Earl Howe set out why the party believed a simple directive was likely to
cause problems for people in the UK.
"It renders illegal a whole range of nutrients which have been safely
marketed for many years, all in the cause European harmonisation," he
said.
"I suppose you could say that it's what the 'nanny state' says you should
be consuming every day and what you're allowed to buy in the shops.
"The risk is that people who want certain vitamins but can't get them will
go on the internet and order them from outside the EU. They won't know
what quality they will be getting and they will have to pay a lot more.
It's a civil liberties issue. It's a 'rights thing'."
