"British meat should be labelled as British" - Farron tells Minister

3.00.00pm GMT Thu 31st Jan 2008

Liberal Democrat spokesman for the countryside and MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale Tim Farron used DEFRA questions in the House of Commons today to press Ministers to make it illegal to label as British anything other than meat produced entirely in Britain.

Mr Farron asked the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at DEFRA, Jonathan Shaw, if he was aware of the practice of importing carcasses from abroad and performing minimal preparatory procedures on them in order that they can be labelled as British.

Responding to Mr Farron's question, Jonathan Shaw MP said:

"People are increasingly looking to where food is grown and reared when purchasing, and the message from this House to the consumer is be discerning, buy British."

Responding to Mr Shaw, Tim Farron said:

"Producers are deceiving consumers by labelling food sourced from overseas as British meat. The Minister advised shoppers to be discerning, which many already are, but I want to see regulations in place that ensure that only meat that is unquestionably British is labelled as such."