Quite a few people in the industry were choking on their cake when Susan Jebb was appointed chair of the Food Standards Agency in 2021.

At the time, there was speculation the food safety body could be looking to police the nation’s waistline by overseeing the obesity strategy, given Jebb’s previous experience heading up the now defunct responsibility deal.

So far, at least, that has yet to materialise, while the government’s obesity strategy has crumbled like a cake with too much gluten in the mix.

Today, however, in the absence of action from the Department of Health, Jebb was on the warpath again.

As part of The Times’ self-appointed new health commission, which also boasts Asda chairman Lord Rose and National Food Strategy author Henry Dimbleby among its members, Jebb suggests people bringing cakes into the office should be demonised like smokers.

“We all like to think we’re rational, intelligent, educated people who make informed choices the whole time and we undervalue the impact of the environment,” she says. “If nobody brought cakes into the office, I would not eat cakes in the day, but because people do bring cakes in, I eat them. Now, OK, I have made a choice, but people were making a choice to go into a smoky pub.”

The paper stresses Jebb was speaking in a personal capacity, rather than as FSA chair. But the comments have gone down like a wet sponge cake with many in the industry.

“Cake and treats are a universal symbol of celebration and togetherness in the workplace,” says Nicola Ward, founder of treat business Cake Drop.

“The most harmful thing to the health of UK workers is lack of movement and work-related stress,” she adds. “Treats are nothing but a red herring. If we are going to start policing food consumption at work, where does it end? Can we expect a ban on morning lattes?”

Another industry source puts it more succinctly: “Either Susan Jebb is chair of the f**king FSA or she’s not.”

Jebb’s comments don’t stop at cake. She also blasts the government u-turn on junk food advertising, accusing the food and advertising industry of overseeing a “complete market failure” that marginalised healthy products.

“Advertising means the businesses with the most money have the biggest influence on people’s behaviour,” she adds. “That’s not fair. At the moment we allow advertising for commercial gain with no health controls on it whatsoever, and we’ve ended up with a complete market failure because what you get advertised is chocolate and not cauliflower.”

It will be interesting to see how much traction the Tory-backing paper’s commission gets with Conservative MPs, given the vacuum in public health policy in recent months.

Former Leon boss Dimbleby, who has yet to officially respond to the government’s National Food Strategy white paper published last summer, is another high-profile figure in The Times commission wearing different hats, given his role as lead non-exec at Defra.

Today he speaks of his “deep disappointment” at the “dysfunctional” Whitehall operation, which has continued to kick the can down the road in tackling obesity. Dimbleby also repeats his call for a new wave of taxes on products high in sugar and salt.

Meanwhile, Asda boss Lord Rose suggested the government ought to make businesses legally responsible for the health of their employees.

It all sounds a bit like an ingredients mix for a new National Food Strategy. Why didn’t anyone think of that before?

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