Ask your MP to end sham GM 'public engagement process'
03 June 2010
Two leading members of the Food Standards Agency’s group on public engagement on the issue of GM have resigned after exposing that the process is a sham, and is rigged towards attempting to encourage the public to support GM food. There has been widespread outrage that public money is being spent to attempt to manipulate society’s view on this issue. The Soil Association has called for the process to be shut down.
If you agree with us, please write to your MP and make your voice heard on this issue
Write to your MP asking them to support the call to end the fake public engagement process and include a copy of Peter Melchett’s letter. See also the letter signed by the Soil Association, Friends of the Earth, GM Freeze, GMWatch and the Soy Alliance.
To contact your local MP you need to know their name:
You can then email them by using their name in the following way: firstnamesurname@parliament.uk - for example davidcameron@parliament.uk
If you prefer you can send a letter to:
‘Local MP’s name’ MP (i.e. David Cameron MP)
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA
When you write please send a copy of your letter to Emma Hockridge at the Soil Association. Email
ehockridge@soilassociation.org or write to Emma Hockridge, Soil Association, South Plaza, Marlborough Street, Bristol, BS1 3NX
Get involved
Read Peter Melchett's letter
In response to Dr Helen Wallace’s resignation from the Steering Group for the Food Standards Agency’s GM dialogue, Peter Melchett, Soil Association Policy Director, has called on Lord Rooker, the Chair of the FSA, to stop wasting public money trying to promote the old government's and Tony Blair's obsession with getting the British public to like GM food.
Coalition letter demands FSA stop wasting money on 'spurious' GM assessment
Following the resignation of both Dr Helen Wallace and Professor Brian Wynne from the FSA's Steering Group on GM, the Soil Association, Friends of the Earth, GM Freeze, GMWatch and the Soy Alliance have jointly signed a letter to Lord Rooker saying they do not intend to have anything to do with this 'spurious' GM assessment and waste of public money.
Read the Daily Mail articles on the issue:
Advisers walk out in fury over £500,000 GM food PR exercise
An official public consultation into GM food has been thrown into chaos following protests that it has been rigged. The exercise by the Food Standards Agency could now be axed following the resignation of two leading advisers working on it. Policy director at the Soil Association, Peter Melchett, called on the FSA to shut down the GM exercise. “Most people could never understand why the last government asked the FSA to carry out what many of us believed was intended to be a pro-GM propaganda exercise,” he said. “It was pursuing one of Tony Blair's obsessions and cost a large amount of public money.”
Daily Mail (3 June, p.12)
GM food and a sinister bid to twist public opinion
Joanna Blythman comments in the Mail: “In its eager embrace of the agro-chemical giants, the FSA has betrayed its founding principle to maintain food safety. The lack of ethics can be seen at its most glaring in the agency's support for GM foods…Not only has it acted like a cheerleader for the big GM companies, it has also tried to twist public opinion in favour of their sinister agenda.”
Daily Mail (3 June, p.14)