In furtherance of the debate that's not a debate, I would just say this.
First of all, I would refer all of my colleagues to the preamble, if people need any guidance. I have rarely seen a preamble this long and this detailed. It sets out in, frankly, unusual detail precisely what the bill is for, what it's targeted at and what its purpose is. That purpose is to prevent the marketing of unhealthy foods to children.
Following from our previous discussion about prescribed foods, this bill is not aimed at a particular advertiser. It's aimed at the advertising of a particular food. If Tim Hortons was advertising a great big drippy chocolate sugared donut on a board in a hockey arena, I presume that might be on the prescribed foods list that exceeds the prescribed sugar. I don't think anybody in this room would want that advertisement to be seen by children under 13. That's the purpose of this.
Now, Tim Hortons serves lots of healthy food. They could advertise coffee. I presume coffee is not going to be on this list. By the way, coffee is probably not being targeted at children under 13. There are healthy sandwiches that they sell.
With Coca-Cola, I'm not quite sure because I'm not sure that Coca-Cola.... I mean, Coca-Cola may sell water. Coca-Cola is not being prevented from sponsoring or advertising in an arena. It's what we are permitting them to advertise to children under 13. It's the prescribed foods that we're prohibiting, so I would imagine that a bottle of Coke probably will be prescribed and, frankly, shouldn't be targeted to children even if it's masqueraded in a sports arena. Frankly, I think that's incongruous when kids are engaged in a healthy activity like skating or hockey. Why would we counter that by advertising a sugar beverage to them that is completely counter to that activity?
I just want to conclude by reminding us that there was some pretty devastating testimony on this subject. Dr. Tom Warshawski said:
I'm not disparaging the role of physical activity. As the speakers from Jumpstart and Participaction said, physical activity is so important for mental health and fitness, but it's not the major lever to affect unhealthy weights.
The other part of it is this. He said:
The budget for marketing unhealthy foods and beverages to kids is over $1 billion per year. It uses sophisticated marketing spokespersons, sportspeople, cartoon characters. It's pervasive. It's all the way through the Internet and social media. There are billions of views per year in social media. It's a cannon compared to the popgun of media literacy.
I think we have to send a clear message. If we want to protect our kids from the very effective and sophisticated advertising techniques and billions of dollars spent to try to attract children to products that will harm their health, then I think that has to be the dominant goal of this bill.
I'm comforted and I'm satisfied that this bill is targeting the prescribed foods that exceed the prescribed fat, sodium and sugar capacities. That will be carefully and surgically listed so that this is the goal.
That's why I'm not concerned about, frankly, the interests of advertisers who want to peddle unhealthy food. I'm concerned about protecting our children from that. I think that this bill clearly, through the preamble and through the actual wording of it, makes that distinction very well.
I don't think that any advertiser who wishes to support sports or athletic programs is prohibited from doing so. We're just not letting them use that as a vehicle to push unhealthy products on kids.