I think the distribution of good quality food in the UK is unfair. Am I wrong?

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

I'm watching 'Britain's Dicgusting Foods' on BBC1, how on earth can a cheap, value chicken kiev have only a titchy amount of chicken in it (and they look like shit)? These are aimed at people on low budgets, I recon the premium kiev (costing 3 times as much) contains more chicken so we must have a huge lottery of food in the UK, if you are on a low income then you are destined to buy this shite unless you are clever with your money (which some of the UK are not). This seems unfair to me. Shouldn't good quality food be availiable for everyone? You are what you eat after all.

[TheLoyalShepherd]

There is no such thing as cheap food though. It costs a lot of money to produce. You spend less and get less. It's not fair, but then it's up to businesses to pay their staff a better wage so they can afford decent food.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

It costs alot to produce but when stores such as Iceland sell their 'produce' at lower prices then there's a discrapency (sp?) Who's buying the value burgers with hardly any meat in them?

[fembear]

"if you are on a low income then you are destined to buy this shite"

Er, no. Don't buy processed food - buy ingredients and cook yourself. Cheaper and better for you. And not every meal has to contain meat.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

I also said that if you are on a low income then you are destined to buy this shite unless you are clever with your money.

Meals are not all meat, you are right fembear. Why is meat in the UK so variable though, I mean a tin of 'hotdogs' for 30p or a packet of frankfurters for £2.05. If you are on a budget then what would you choose?

[pooexplosions]

You might as well say that housing is unfair, or wages, or that everyone should be able to afford a car, or a holiday or nice clothes.

I'd agree, but then I'm a communist. If you like the free market, then this is what happens.

You might be better off arguing that everyone should be given lessons on how to eat well on a budget, or that shitty food should be banned.

[fembear]

But it isn't being "clever", it's just good old fashioned budgeting that women have done forever. Have home-made vegetable curry one night and you can afford the frankfurters the next night.

[MillyR]

There about 3 million malnourished people in the UK. Most of them are elderly. They come from a generation that did know how to cook - brought up before most convenience food was widely available.

I think it seems unlikely that all of these pensioners are malnourished through ignorance of cooking and budgeting skills.

[abbierhodes]

I think you're using odd foods as examples tbh. I wouldn't buy either type of processed sausage, nor a chicken kiev of either quality.

My cheap meals consist of the best quality mince or chicken I can afford. (Which isn't always great!)

Processed meals are a rare 'treat'.Whether it's from Iceland or Tesco's finest it's still mass produced salty crap.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

Good point Milly

So would you say education is the key?

[coldtits]

Mostly pensioners cannot access the services through disability/frailness. They cannot get to the markets/butchers because they cannot wlk there.

Also, many elderly people don't care about what they eat any more. I know an old man who would only eat ham sandwiches, and he lived in a nursing home and had access to 3 hot nutritious meals per day. He didn't wish to eat them. He wanted ham sandwiches.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

The odd food examples are what the bloke's talking about on BBC1!!

So who buys the 0% meat hotdogs and the 10% chicken chicken kievs?

[duchesse]

Ah Milly, there are so many reasons why elderly people do not necessarily eat well that I'm not sure it's helpful to bring them in. Loneliness, illness, lack of motivation to cook for just one, malabsorption, etc... all may have more of a role to play in making some older people malnourished than mere poverty. And I have seen plenty of older people buy plenty of crap food. Maybe not ready meals, but tinned veg and fruit and spam most definitely. I suspect not for financial reasons.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

I knew someone who worked in a nursery that ds attended, their budget for the whole nursery for food for the week was....£50!!! Alot of processed food and hotdogs

[MillyR]

I never mentioned poverty.

But a lot of the drive to improve our diets is based on life expectancy. It is always made out that if you feed your child a bag of crisps they will not see seventy. I suspect a lot of life expectancy actually has to do with the lives that people live when they become old.

[MillyR]

I buy 0% meat hotdogs; I'm vegetarian.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]