You've had your chips

In the land of the deep-fried Mars bar and the food desert, it's time for employers to come to the rescue

DRIBBLING in anticipation, you approach the staff canteen. It's your favourite. Freshly caught, lightly grilled sea bass with steamed organic vegetables. Tragically, it's a dream. Must be. Your sea bass is being lovingly prepared by Ainsley Harriott. Naked.

Here in the land of the deep fried Mars bar, workplace food is not something we do well. Some horrible facts are in order. We have higher blood pressure, more strokes, and higher cancer rates than almost everywhere, but what we really excel at is heart disease. Premature death rates here are only surpassed by the deteriorating health figures in Eastern Europe. What links all these statistics together? You guessed it. Diet. The Scottish diet is a recipe for early death - high in saturated fat and low in fibre-rich fruit and vegetables. So what's all this got to do with work? A great deal. The 'more leisure less work' predictions made in the 60s and 70s have proved to be Utopian nonsense. Work is where we spend most of our adult lives (while awake) and hence where we eat most of our food. We work the longest hours in Europe and some of the longest in the world. We've been enslaved by technology rather than liberated by it. Just what are we eating at work? Mostly complete rubbish, nutritionally speaking. Partly because that is what's on offer. There was quite a bit of publicity recently about deprived urban areas being 'food deserts', and access to rubbish in canteens is a luxury. Many of us make do with vending machines, or more frequently, leave our place of work to get some fast food, which we then eat 'fast' on the way back to the office or at our work station. Stress just make things worse. Our bodies prepare for action, 'fight or flight', not digestion, so we don't even get the benefit of the rubbish that we are eating. Ironically, our new 'food deserts' are often quite beautiful places (from a distance); clean, well-designed buildings where hundreds and thousands of us are dying slowly; buildings where very little thought has been given to the health and wellbeing of the people who work in them. But are our bad eating habits the responsibility of employers? Quite possibly. Employers have a duty of care and are obliged to conduct risk assessments. If premature death from heart disease, cancer or stroke isn't a health risk, what is? We're all so concerned about safety, we've completely forgotten about health. Glasgow's Dental Hospital has shown what can be done when health is made a priority. Helen Holland's efforts as catering manager have deservedly contributed to the hospital winning bronze, silver, and recently a gold award under the Scotland's Health at Work scheme. Holland has transformed cooking and preparation methods, uses healthier ingredients, and they now offer healthy and vegetarian options on the menu every day. "Initially the reaction wasn't very positive," says, Holland, "but I persuaded people to try things and now we frequently run out of the healthier options." So, entrenched behaviours can change, but it's a struggle. Anne Pavan of catering giant, Gardner Merchant, explained that they sometimes have to use 'covert' practices, to make what we eat more healthy. We Scots demand stodge (with chips, of course) so that is what we get, but with less saturated fat, sugar and salt. It's nice to know they're trying to save us from ourselves. So what is the prognosis for Scottish workplace food and nutrition in the new millennium? We can be cautiously optimistic. There are still very few enlightened employers, but the word is spreading that healthy employees add value, and that investing in their wellbeing pays dividends in the long run. And yes, that does show up on the balance sheet. Our present legal safeguards are minimal. There is an Approved Code of Practice (Health and Safety Commission 1992). Very pretty, not legally binding and nobody's heard of it might sum it up. We badly need some health legislation and a body with teeth to enforce it. That's the 'stick' part. There also needs to be a 'carrot', incentives for organisations to invest in health, particularly cash-strapped small businesses. Grants towards health-related training would be a start. Even though what we eat at work is a matter of personal choice, all of us who care about this issue - and that should include employers, health professionals, union reps and employees - have a duty to make sure that choice is an informed one. One last shocking statistic. Despite the fact that we eat less fruit and veg, more saturated-fat laden meat products, more salt and more sugar-rich confectionery than anywhere else in the world, most of us when asked think our diet is healthy. That puts the scale of the task into perspective. Labour's recent White Paper, Towards A Healthier Scotland, announced an increase in funding for the Diet Action Plan to promote the consumption of fruit and vegetables, by #2 million over the next three years. A national dietary co-ordinator will also be appointed to encourage food producers to lower the price of healthy foods in a bid to combat the appalling diets of Scots catch up

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