US/UK trade deal?

Sadly meat-eating families on very low incomes will eat it if it's cheap enough, Chocolatelovinggran.

If you are simply filling bellies you will buy what you can.

People on better incomes will buy birds which have been farmed differently. Those with more cash still (or who are more concerned about animal welfare will probably buy organic. I expect middle income families may well buy organic too - just less of it.

You may well be right NotSpaghetti, but it does offer a way around a potential deal breaker. As you say, it may provide cheaper food for our neediest families as well.
Labelling gives everyone a choice: I suspect that the market for such a product might be a little disappointing to the USA exporters.

Ilovecheese

Wylow3 that is what I think as well. He doesn't want us making a closer trading alliance with the EU or other countries in preference to the USA. He wants us to believe that we can't possibly manage without America.

I completely agree with you and with Wylow and not really sure why anyone would want to work with Trump or Vance

Chocolatelovinggran

You may well be right NotSpaghetti, but it does offer a way around a potential deal breaker. As you say, it may provide cheaper food for our neediest families as well.
Labelling gives everyone a choice: I suspect that the market for such a product might be a little disappointing to the USA exporters.

Last time there was publicity about a potential deal with the US, during the post Brexit Boris Johnson era, (which never happened) one of the proposed conditions from the US side was that there was no labelling of country of origin. I suspect that might be brought up again...

That would cause real difficulty with our trade with the EU I would have thought.

The EU is our biggest customer.

Grantanow

Nothing at the expense of a closer relationship with the EU, our most important trading partner.

Definitely. I hope RR treads carefully.

The cost of food is not really an issue for low income families, their highest expenditure is housing cost. We do not have a problem with starvation the problem is obesity - too much high calorie junk food.
I do most of the food shopping and meal planning and there are plenty of basic food ingredients on supermarket shelves at budget prices. Many families would benefit from smaller quantities of better quality food, basic family nutrition is not rocket science, it just takes a little more time and thought instead of buying ready meals, takeaways. In particular I just don’t understand why parents can’t give the kids a glass of milk and a piece of toast or cereals before school, are they really short of 5 mins?.

Hmm , MaizieD - so the makers of this product don't want it labelled. I wonder why....?

I'm sorry David but why do we have food banks?

And Chocolatelovinggran - why should the poorest amongst us be put in a situation where their food standards offer is so low?

If you have ever worked with struggling families you soon realise the privilege of having a real choice.

None of our cats will touch Costco (usa) chicken . I know it sounds mad but we decided if they won’t eat it ,neither will we. This includes a stray cat we fed which normally would eat absolutely anything. We don’t have so many ready meals here, not much to choose from , easier to buy fresh.

NotSpaghetti

I'm sorry David but why do we have food banks?

And Chocolatelovinggran - why should the poorest amongst us be put in a situation where their food standards offer is so low?

If you have ever worked with struggling families you soon realise the privilege of having a real choice.

It’s not the cost of food that’s the problem it’s the cost of other stuff, we don’t have housing banks where you can get free housing.

Dear God, I have never heard of so much victim blaming! You need a fridge to keep milk cool and a toaster or oven to make toast. Some families don't have that, are living in bed and breakfast rooms with no or limited access to cooking facilities, hence the need for takeaway food. Anyway, I don't see what's wrong with families having fish and chips occasionally, especially if they're poor. Smaller quantities of better quality food? These families are about filling bellies and making money go as far as it can. Quality food costs more than cheaper food. You sound like 30p Lee Anderson. Tell me you don't know what it's like to live in absolute poverty- just read your post.

And it's not housing versus food. That's a very simplistic view

David I think you are a bit sneery about people who are struggling. Too many don't even have milk and bread available all the time.

This is not new, sadly.

I must be dumb ( likely) but I can’t see any victim blaming.

nanna8

I must be dumb ( likely) but I can’t see any victim blaming.

Well, you said it, nanna8...

Just look at David's post. It says the stereotypical middle class platitudes about 'poor' people...

They don't budget properly, they eat the wrong foods which make them fat, anyone can survive on very little money if they put some thought into it. ergo, it's their fault that they're struggling...

It's all been said loads of times before and it gets the debate no further forward.

Perhaps David, (and all the other judgey folk) would like to try feeding a family on a severely curtailed food budget for several weeks and see if they could do better. Perhaps with a restricted energy budget, too, which would limit their ability to cook hot nourishing meals...

What RR actually has said - she has major talks today with her counterparts -

"Despite the chancellor's focus on talks with the US, she suggested that moving closer to the EU on trade was a bigger priority. The UK is preparing for a summit with the EU in May in an attempt to "reset" the relationship between the two.
I understand why there's so much focus on our trading relationship with the US but actually our trading relationship with Europe is arguably even more important, because they're our nearest neighbours and trading partners," she said.

"Obviously I've been meeting Scott Bessent this week whilst I'm in Washington, but I've also this week met the French, the German, the Spanish, the Polish, the Swedish, the Finnish finance ministers - because it is so important that we rebuild those trading relationships with our nearest neighbours in Europe, and we're going to do that in a way that is good for British jobs and British consumers."

(from todays BBC I player report)

NotSpaghetti

David I think you are a bit sneery about people who are struggling. Too many don't even have milk and bread available all the time.

This is not new, sadly.

I’m sure there are “some” that don’t have enough, 60yrs ago we had children who had free school meals, I will guarantee those families that had less than the poorest today.

I state again, food cost is not the issue, food cost was much more expensive in proportion to income years ago. In the 1950s 30% of income was spent on food, today less than 10% is spent.
Feeding children should be is first priority perhaps someone can justify why that is not given by some families.

Sorry David49, but you are missing the point. If families are spending a higher percentage of their income on housing, council tax, energy bills etc., they have a lower percentage of their income to spend on food. It doesn’t matter how cheap it is if you have nothing less after you have paid your other essential bills.

When I read posts like this, I feel there is a real need to resurrect better teaching of cookery in secondary schools.

In my day (early 1960's) Domestic Science was a weekly double lesson teaching a wide range of recipes. By the time I left Grammar School I was able to cook a range of meals, bread and cakes.

My 13 year old GD has Food Tech very occasionally. Her last lesson was to make a pizza. She had to take in a ready made pizza base, a tube of tomato puree and her choice of 3 toppings. The lesson before that was to make a sandwich. No wonder these youngsters leave school reliant on ready meals and takeaways which are far more expensive and often unhealthier than home cooking.

Something else for schools to have to do? Using ready made materials which re available in the shops is surely a good thing? How do Home Economics squeeze it all into their curriculum which will be given to them? An hour a week isn't going to make a difference, I don't think. Of course, parents and grandparents should teach children how to cook, but many are working full time.

Sarnia

When I read posts like this, I feel there is a real need to resurrect better teaching of cookery in secondary schools.

In my day (early 1960's) Domestic Science was a weekly double lesson teaching a wide range of recipes. By the time I left Grammar School I was able to cook a range of meals, bread and cakes.

My 13 year old GD has Food Tech very occasionally. Her last lesson was to make a pizza. She had to take in a ready made pizza base, a tube of tomato puree and her choice of 3 toppings. The lesson before that was to make a sandwich. No wonder these youngsters leave school reliant on ready meals and takeaways which are far more expensive and often unhealthier than home cooking.

I do agree about the teaching of cooking and of course going along with it showing the value of fresh foods and price etc.
For boys and girls, when I was at school only girls did it, (tho frankly we didnt learn about healthy eating very much)
but my son - that would have been early 1990's loved cooking GSCE and its become a lifelong passion.

But....it's probably very costly now to have a cookery room and all the equipment and who gets to pay and bring ingredients and so many wouldnt turn up with them so lessons become less hands on and more theory which doesnt really do the job.

My grandson, here in Wales, is taking a Food and Nutrition GCSE. The syllabus includes, the nutritional value of food, menu planning and reasons for choice as well as costings Practical exam will be a planning, and cooking a three course meal, with a written explanation explaining choice, nutritional value and cost. If one comprehensive school can do this perhaps more could.

That sounds good Pippa but how many schools have dedicated cookery rooms these days? Given many don't even have on site catering ability for school lunches, I can't think they have fully equipped facilities for pupil cooking. It's sad, when I was at school (girl's grammar) we had a well equipped cookery class room. My brother at the boy's grammar never encountered such a beast but did have fully equipped metal and woodworking classrooms.