Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to Ms. Gillis for her presentation. I thought it was quite factual, and it came to conclusions that I can understand. It seemed to me to be quite realistic, based on the data that she studied.
I find it to be in contrast with the food services presentation, which drew conclusions from a lot of the same data but quibbled with words and drew conclusions that were--I'll let you prove me wrong--self-serving.
It may be true that if you do a statistical analysis, Canadians eat as many meals at home as they would have 50, 40, or 30 years ago, but those meals have changed considerably. A lot of it is fast food. You call it quick service, but it's fast food that you don't buy at the drive-through necessarily, but at the grocery store, and stick in the oven or the microwave for a few minutes. Whether it be Pizza Pops, TV dinners, or pizzas themselves, and all that type of food, it's industrially produced, having very low health quality in what's in them.
The same could be said of restaurant services. When you spoke of the percentage of money being spent in restaurants, whether it's a high-income family or not, and the high amount being spent in restaurants doesn't necessarily translate to obesity or food quality than lower amounts, I don't think you're taking into consideration the evolution of the restaurant. Fast foods have gone up the slide. It used to be A&W and McDonald's, but we're into the Pizza Delights, the Boston Pizzas, and all sorts of fast foods that are out there that are perhaps a little bit more upscale but are serving industrially processed foods, that have no chef in the kitchen, that don't buy vegetables and fruit and eggs, and their inputs are basically thirteen ingredients that come pre-packaged in plastic in the back of a tractor-trailer, are dumped in the back of the restaurant or food service place, and are mixed together, or are sent out, put through the warmer, and presented to people as very low-quality food. I think there would be a difference with the homestyle restaurant that we might know, a large differentiation.
We have started to see the fast food group advising people and having some quality food, and I think that is a good move, but that was a volunteer effort, and we read of pullbacks, drawing back out of that area. I have reservations when we look at bills that are going to impose regulations on how we present our products in restaurants, or fast-service food stores, or in grocery stores themselves, but my reservations become hard to argue when I don't see advancement of that. I hear the recognition at this table, but it doesn't translate.
I hear the soft drink industry saying it wants to promote those things, but I watch TV and I understand, like any 13-year-old, that if I drink enough Coca-Cola, or Pepsi, or 7UP, number one, I'm going to own the swimming pool, and number two, it's going to be surrounded by beautiful, nubile bodies, scantily clad 12 months a year. It's only $2.25 a can; it's not a bad deal. But in reality it doesn't work like that. And I see the same type of advertising or promotion of a juice, whether it be reconstituted juice or whether it be fruit flavour added to a bit of liquid and a lot of sugar. I don't see that differentiation.
So I worry a bit about the message we're hearing today and whether we're getting real advancement from the food service industry in healthy living and promoting true choices for consumers.