President’s bulletin: the future of food regulation – who holds the power and who protects the public?

Fundamental questions are now being asked about how food businesses are regulated. In this bulletin, CIEH President Mark Elliott, delves into the critical debate and growing concern around recent developments.

Does the current direction of travel for food regulation risk undermining the very principles that protect public health? At the same time, mounting pressures on food security and resilience, from climate change to geopolitical instability, risk pushing regulatory safeguards into the background, as the imperative to secure food supply begins to take precedence.

Proposals from the Food Standards Agency (FSA) on the future of food regulation include developing a nationally delivered approach in England for the regulation of some large food businesses. This proposal is rooted in a desire to strengthen consistency and effectiveness and to make better use of existing data and assurance systems, alongside in-person inspections.

Professor Chris Elliott (a CIEH Vice President) writing in New Food Magazine - Reinventing food regulation: the UK’s next big step in consumer protection - outlines the shift towards a more centralised and data-driven approach, with increased use of assurance systems, technology and national oversight to manage risk across complex food businesses. This is presented as a positive evolution, helping the system adapt to modern supply chains while making best use of available resources. At the same time, it sits alongside ongoing pressures on local authority capacity, where environmental health teams continue to balance competing demands. In this context, it is important that emerging models complement, rather than replace, the value of independent, local regulatory insight.

Professor Elliott states, “One point that must never be lost in this conversation is the extraordinary work carried out day in and day out by local authority food teams. Our Environmental Health Officers and Trading Standards professionals must remain the backbone of the UK’s food assurance system”.

Taken together with a recent development in a Primary Authority (PA) partnership they point towards a more complex, and increasingly centralised or hybrid, regulatory landscape. As these changes evolve, it will be important to ensure that local intelligence, accountability, democracy, professional judgement, and the ability to act decisively in the public interest are not subverted.

A new PA partnership between Milton Keynes City Council and Shield Safety Group is now in operation –“Safe to Trade is the first comprehensive UK third-party food safety assurance programme for the hospitality sector”. As environmental health professionals, it is right that we take a thoughtful and measured interest in changes that may influence how regulation is delivered in practice. While these developments may present potential opportunities for improvement, it is also important to consider the wider drivers shaping them, including efforts to reduce regulatory burdens on business and the growing influence of large corporations. The key question remains: are these changes genuinely improving public health outcomes, or introducing risks that should concern every consumer?

The PA framework, established under the Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Act 2008, was designed to support consistency, reduce duplication, and provide clarity for businesses operating across multiple local authority areas. At its best, it enables regulators and businesses to work constructively together, improving standards while making effective use of limited public resources.

This new PA partnership highlights a growing role for assured systems and third-party verification in informing regulatory approaches. This is not a new concept. Forms of earned recognition have been explored for some time. This is not inherently problematic. It has benefits – freeing up regulatory resource, rewarding good performers, and encouraging investment in compliance. There are also risks – over-reliance on third-party assurance, reduced independent verification, potential two-tier regulation and a gateway to regulatory capture if not carefully governed. Its application within a nationally recognised Inspection Plan represents a notable development. Earned recognition can support more intelligent, risk-based regulation, but only where it is underpinned by strong oversight, transparency, and the ability to intervene decisively, and is not influenced inappropriately when standards fall short.

It is important to acknowledge that both this PA partnership development and future of food regulation proposals sit within a broader policy context. Successive governments have placed emphasis, with varying degrees of legal direction, on reducing regulatory burdens on business and supporting economic growth. In its green paper on health in 2009, the Conservative government said they would scale back the role and remit of the FSA and place it under ministerial control.

In 2010 the Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, intended to abolish the FSA completely. His plans were put on hold with the horse meat food fraud incident. That ambition is understandable, however, it also reinforces the importance of maintaining a very careful balance, ensuring that efforts to reduce, streamline or modernise regulation do not inadvertently weaken the safeguards that protect environmental and public health, safety, and the environment.

In March 2025 the Prime Minister pledged that “we would cut the administrative costs of regulation by 25%: a reduction that I can today announce will save businesses £6 billion a year by the end of this Parliament”. The government is on record to “back the builders not the blockers”. There are many examples of disastrous deadly failures of reducing regulatory burdens. Effective regulation is not simply about doing less; it is about doing the right things, in the right way, and with confidence. Local accountability and democracy is an important moderator, which is not always available within the private sector.

Recent history and experience reminds us of the need for caution. The horse meat fraud incident demonstrated that even where systems and data appear robust, over-reliance on supplier assurance within complex supply chains can allow falsified information to go undetected.

A large supermarket chain participating in the FSA National Level Regulation trial misled customers for months by claiming a top Food Hygiene Rating of five, when in reality it held a zero rating. If such a basic failure can persist unchecked, it raises a stark question: what confidence can consumers have in assurance and data systems so heavily reliant on corporate self-representation?

For over 150 years, dating back to the landmark Public Health Act of 1875, the efficacy of environmental and public health regulation has heavily relied upon the foundational pillars of local government action, democratic mandate, and local accountability. By mandating that local authorities appoint Sanitary Inspectors and Medical Officers of Health, this landmark legislation decentralised the enforcement of sanitation, water supplies, food safety and housing standards, forcing conurbations to become directly accountable to residents for environmental and public health crises.

These new 21st Century developments bring the centralisation of enforcement into sharp focus, forcing urgent questions about whether this direction of travel improves public protection or risks weakening it and whether, in seeking reform, we are attempting to fix a system that is not in fact broken and is just lacking adequate resourcing at street level.

Environmental health has long been underpinned by principles of independence, consistency, and the protection of public health. As new models emerge, it is essential that these core values continue to guide decision-making. Confidence in any system, whether public or private, must rest on transparency, robustness, and accountability. It is also important that, in seeking proportionality, we do not unintentionally move towards a position where regulatory experience differs significantly depending on participation in particular schemes, or where public assurance becomes overly reliant on paid for privately commissioned verification. Whatever new frameworks are introduced, the reality remains unchanged: when things go wrong, it is local authorities who are left to deal with public complaints and the consequences.

Food security and resilience are no longer emerging concerns, they are urgent and escalating risks. In February 2025, the National Preparedness Commission highlighted the UK’s vulnerabilities in 7 Steps to Narrow the UK Civil Food Resilience Gap. There is little evidence that these risks have materially diminished. Indeed, the trajectory suggests the opposite.

We must be absolutely clear about what this means. Pressures such as climate change, geopolitical instability, and supply chain disruption will not simply challenge the food system, they will reshape it. In such circumstances, the risk is not only that standards are tested, but that food regulation itself is displaced, as the imperative to secure supply begins to outweigh the systems designed to assure safety, quality and integrity.

The theme of my CIEH Presidency is water, and this offers a particularly instructive lens. The experience of water regulation in England, including the role of the Environment Agency, has demonstrated how quickly confidence can be eroded where there is a perception that regulatory systems are too closely aligned with those they regulate and receive recompense.

In recent years, public and professional debate has increasingly focused on whether the balance between oversight and industry engagement has been appropriately maintained. Even where intentions are sound, the risk, or perception, of regulatory capture can weaken trust, reduce the perceived independence of regulators, and ultimately affect outcomes for communities and the environment. That experience underlines the importance of maintaining clear separation, transparency, and demonstrable independence in all regulatory models. The risk of “revolving doors” between industry and regulators, where individuals move between oversight roles and the sectors they regulate, can further blur the boundaries of independence and reinforce perceptions that regulatory systems are not always operating at sufficient distance from those they are designed to hold to account.

Food regulatory institutions in the UK should have robust mechanisms for addressing commercial conflicts of interest, declares a 2023 study by Professor Tim Lang (a CIEH Vice President) and Professor Erik Millstone. The study - An approach to conflicts of interest in UK food regulatory institutions - reviews declarations of conflicts of interest in the FSA Board and Committee since its creation and makes four recommendations on how to reverse this practice. “Our research examines which individuals are playing influential roles in UK food policymaking, particularly at Defra and the FSA. Our research highlights that many of these have conflicts of interest and their influence risks undermining the trustworthiness of both DEFRA and the FSA and of food safety policymaking in the UK, which, if not addressed, has the potential to put the public’s health at risk”, states Professor Millstone.

George Monbiot an environmentalist and an influential voice in green politics, advocating for systemic change to protect the planet, has repeatedly highlighted how reductions in funding for monitoring and enforcement have created the conditions for widespread environmental harm, particularly recently in relation to illegal waste activity. He points to a growing network of unregulated or poorly controlled waste sites where criminal operators exploit weakened oversight, undercut legitimate businesses, and leave behind serious risks to land, water and public health. In this context, what is often framed as efficiency or deregulation can, in practice, amount to a gradual erosion of the state’s ability to enforce the law, allowing environmental crime to proliferate largely unchecked. He refers to this as “deregulation by stealth”. The result is not only environmental damage, but a clear example of how reduced regulatory presence can shift the burden and consequences back onto communities and the public purse at much greater cost.

For practitioners on the ground, the practical implications of PA Inspection Plans will be key. These plans are designed to support consistency, but they must also work effectively within the realities of local enforcement. Professional judgement remains central, and it is vital that officers feel able to act where necessary to protect health, without undue constraint, and in a way that maintains public confidence in the fairness and integrity of the system.

This is therefore an extremely important moment for reflection as a profession. The CIEH will continue to engage constructively with all partners, local authorities, national regulators, and private sector organisations, to ensure that evolving approaches deliver the outcomes we all seek: safer environments, healthier communities, and a fair and effective regulatory system, without fear or favour.

I am keen that the CIEH plays an active role in supporting members through this period. That includes providing opportunities to share experiences, highlighting good practice, and contributing to the wider conversation and debate about the future of regulation.

Innovation and change in regulatory delivery is inevitable. Our role is to ensure that it is shaped in a way that strengthens, rather than dilutes, the fundamental purpose of environmental health. By maintaining a clear focus on public protection, professional integrity, and evidence-led practice, we can help ensure that any new approaches build confidence across the system, both within the profession and among the communities we serve but at the same time rooting out unsatisfactory regulatory practices before they become serious failures.

Previous experience in the food system (and all EH pillars) over 150 years consistently shows that effective regulation depends on independence, credible enforcement, and a clear separation between those who regulate and those who are regulated.

The Food Standards Agency was established in the wake of the BSE crisis to provide independent, evidence-led oversight of food safety, with a clear and deliberate separation from both political and industry influence. That independence remains fundamental. However, as regulatory approaches evolve, through increased centralisation, the expansion of Primary Authority arrangements, and growing reliance on third-party assurance, it is right to question how that independence is maintained in practice. Where regulatory systems bring oversight and commercial interests into closer alignment, the distinction between assurance and enforcement can become less clear. Preserving that distinction is essential, not only for professional integrity, but for maintaining the confidence of the public.

There is a risk that, without careful calibration, current proposed reforms may begin to move the system away from these established strengths for protecting the public.

I welcome communication from members – [email protected]