Wales Bans Junk Food Displays Near Tills to Fight Obesity

Welsh supermarkets will soon be banned from displaying unhealthy snacks near tills or on their website homepages after the Senedd narrowly approved new obesity-tackling plans. 🛒

From March 2026, junk foods including pizza, chocolate, and cereal will have to be removed from shop entrances and the end of aisles in businesses with 50 or more employees. The rules will also end sugary drink refills and certain buy-one-get-one-free promotions.

Health Secretary Jeremy Miles said: “We want to make it easier for people to make healthier choices and we’ll achieve this by improving the food environment around them. If we ensure healthier food and drinks are more available, accessible and visible to people in shops and stores, it will support our efforts to reduce obesity rates and improve public health.”

The measure passed by just one vote (25-24) in the Senedd this week and mirrors similar restrictions introduced in England since 2022.

Conservative MS James Evans criticised the decision as “nanny state nonsense,” arguing: “Welsh Conservatives believe in personal responsibility. Efforts to tackle obesity must be focussed on providing support for grassroots sports clubs, increase the amount of sport played in schools, and encouraging more people to get active – not forcibly pushing up the price of the weekly shop.”

Plaid Cymru’s Mabon ap Gwynfor warned that while obesity places “huge pressures” on health services, the regulations are “entirely inadequate” and represent “half a solution.”

NHS specialist dietician Sioned Quirke welcomed the move but described obesity as “extremely complex and multi-faceted,” adding: “We need to help people make the healthier choice the cheapest choice, and the easiest choice.” 🍎