Day 047 - 07 Nov 94 - Page 44

     
     1   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  No.  If parents thought that, by and large,
     2        the people advertising the food and drink on television
     3        were the ones who were producing healthy or wholesome food,
     4        that might explain the preponderance of answers?
     5        A.  Yes, it might, my Lord.  Though I am not an expert on
     6        nutrition, I understand it to be the case that no foods are
     7        bad foods; it is the balanced diet, the total of all that
     8        one consumes which is the issue.  So it is quite difficult
     9        to see how an individual food can talk in any significant
    10        way about contributing to a balanced diet.  Indeed, the ITC
    11        Code rather asks them not to do so.
    12
    13   MS. STEEL:  There is a cumulative effect of advertising, is
    14        there not, as well as just the individual advertisement?
    15        A.  There may be.  I do not think we normally know that.  I
    16        am not sure that there has been any research done into that
    17        direction.  Individual advertisements are paid for by
    18        individual companies.  They are really only concerned with
    19        the impact of what they have said.
    20
    Q.   So you have not done any research into the cumulative
    22        effect of advertising?
    23        A.  No.
    24
    25   Q.   So, if the vast majority of adverts were encouraging the
    26        consumption of snack foods, sweets, crisps, say in
    27        children's television, or sugary products, then you are
    28        not, you don't do any research into whether that might have
    29        a negative affect overall on the child's diet?
    30        A.  No, we do not, because we are aware that there are many
    31        other influences on any individual diet, any child's diet,
    32        in addition to advertisements. They are merely one small
    33        part of the total. It's probable that the impact of school
    34        food is much greater than that of advertisements and it's
    35        certain the impact of the parental and family decisions on
    36        food is much greater than that of advertising. So no, we
    37        have not looked at the impact in isolation of
    38        advertisements on diet.
    39
    40   Q.   Question three "I often end up buying advertised food or
         drinks which I wouldn't otherwise buy because my children
    42        asked me to and 35 percent of parents agreed with that
    43        statement with 52% disagreeing. Parents who have children
    44        under five are least likely to agree...... Higher level of
    45        agreement, 46 percent of parents with children aged between
    46        five to 14 agree, while 15 percent disagree. Children aged
    47        between five to 10 are most likely to be able to use their
    48        pester power on parents. 49 percent of parents with
    49        children between aged five to 10 expressed agreement
    50        compared with 30 percent of others. 
    51        There are no clear social class trends to this question, 
    52        however parents in Scotland show the greatest agreement, 59 
    53        percent compared with 38 percent of English parents."
    54        Having read that, I mean, does that concern you?
    55        A.  I think the reference to pester power, and indeed I
    56        think that whole paragraph has been written by the NFA and
    57        not by Morey, so I think I am right in saying that is
    58        interpretation rather than research.
    59        Now, the way I respond to question three is, naturally
    60        parents quite often buy products which their children ask