CONSUMER CHOICE IN VITAMINS AND MINERALS

That this House notes that tens of millions of British consumers have been taking safe and popular vitamin and mineral supplements for many decades to help them achieve and maintain optimum health; observes that such supplements are already required to be safe and appropriately-labelled under the provisions of the Food Safety Act; congratulates Consumers for Health Choice on its campaigns to defend consumer choice in this area; rejects as disproportionate and unnecessary the setting of restrictive maximum permitted levels for nutrients in such products as proposed by the Food Supplements Directive the further implementation of which would threaten the viability of 700 independent health food retailers and cost over 4,000 jobs in this country; and urges Ministers to continue to do all that they can to resist this threat to specialist UK retailers and their customers.