Liz Truss challenged to eat ‘Frankenfood’ she wants to bring to the UK
LIZ TRUSS has been challenged to eat a ‘set menu’ of cheap American food which her Cabinet critics fear will flood Britain under the terms of a US trade deal she is trying to strike.
The International Trade Secretary, who has been accused of risking the future of our farmers by allowing lower-quality so-called ‘Frankenfood’ into the UK – such as chlorinated chicken and hormone-treated beef – was presented with the foodstuffs by Liberal Democrat leadership contender Layla Moran.
Ms Moran, who says that she opposes the idea of letting America ‘rewrite
Britain’s rulebook’, suggested Ms Truss could start her ‘Trumpian feast’ with a platter of meat injected with antibiotics, followed by a main course of either hormone-filled beef or chlorine-washed chicken, genetically modified potatoes and a Yorkshire pudding made with milk full of bovine hormones.
Ms Truss could then finish with a genetically modified fruit platter and coffee made with milk polluted with pesticides, she added.
The light-hearted offer by Ms Moran belies an increasingly bitter Cabinet battle over the trade deal, with Ms Truss ranged against what her allies call the ‘protectionists’, such as Environment Secretary George Eustice.
The Mail on Sunday, which launched its Save Our Family Farms campaign three weeks ago, reported last week that Boris Johnson had sided with Mr Eustice by ruling that US foods must be subject to high import tariffs, which would price them out of the UK market.
Ms Truss, a staunch free-marketeer, argued that the duties should be reduced to nothing within a decade.
US negotiators have made clear that opening the door to American agricultural exports is their primary demand in the talks.
Ms Moran said last night: ‘It’s no surprise that people are concerned about US foods entering our supermarkets.
‘We’re used to world-leading British standards, and I take pride in eating high-quality food grown by our farmers. The Government must at the very least prove this food is safe before forcing it on the public and selling British farmers down the river.
‘I am challenging Liz Truss and her Cabinet colleagues to eat a post-Brexit banquet of sub-standard US foods, a Trumpian feast ranging from chlorinated chicken to hormone-treated beef.’
It is understood that Ms Truss believes the claims are ‘ludicrous scaremongering’ on the grounds that she had never argued for lower import standards and the Government had committed to transferring all existing EU food safety provisions on to the UK statute book.