British Health Department officials have asked food, fitness and alcohol companies to pitch in and design health-related policies, according to the UK's Guardian. In this rather shocking move, which seems like a perverse Christmas fable, industry leaders can now give themselves a holiday treat: submitting legislative wish lists and steering officials away from unfriendly rules.
The new arrangements have been described by the health minister as "responsibility deal networks." The convoluted language obscures the insidiousness and suggests a return to Thatcher-Reaganite policies unwinding the state from its public services. The news comes amidst a seismic shift in Britain towards the right. Following the unveiling of David Cameron's Big Society, the Prime Minister's initiative to slash government spending and spin the lost services into a sort of citizen governance, the "responsibility deals" seem like a first wave of deep changes.
While the effects of the Big Society in Britain are not yet evident, the tides may reach the American shores just in time for a new, Republican-led Congress. Reagan's emphasis on personal responsibility and parsimonious social services cannot be far from the to-do lists of GOP legislators. The British effort to deliver the public's safety net into the hands of industry--those whose interest in health and well-being answers to the bottom line--may very well strike U.S. conservatives as sensible policy.
When the Farm Bill, along with President Obama's tenure, enter the political ring in 2012, there will be a multitude of voices calling for less government involvement in the food system. One side will certainly pull for fewer subsidies for unhealthy foods; the other may aim to privatize nutrition and feeding programs. At a time when fast food companies spend $4b annually to advertise, some of which is funded with USDA dollars, it hardly seems necessary to throw them a legislative bone as well.
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