SMOKY bacon-flavoured crisps and other artificially smoke-flavoured foods are set to be outlawed under regulations being drafted in Brussels.

The European parliament has declared that the chemical producing the distinctive taste, extracted from condensed woodsmoke, may contain cancer-causing agents.

New rules would spell the end for artificially flavoured “smoked” foods from salmon to char-grilled burgers. Barbecue sauces such as those at McDonald’s and Burger King would have to be withdrawn.

The latest measures, 12 years after Brussels was accused of trying to ban prawn cocktail-flavoured crisps because of rules on artificial sweeteners, have angered critics who say Brussels is again overstepping its authority.

“It will cause havoc in the food and drinks industry,” said Chris Heaton-Harris, MEP for East Midlands, where Britain’s most popular smoky bacon crisps are made.

The measures, already passed by the European parliament’s influential environment committee, will have a disproportionately severe impact in Britain, where people eat more snacks than any other European country. They spend £5 billion a year on crisps and six times as much as Italians on snacks.

Although epidemiological studies have shown an increased risk of certain types of cancer in places such as Hong Kong, where there is high consumption of smoked foods, the link is by association only.

Critics of the new regulations — which could be law by this summer if passed by the European Council — described them as unnecessarily severe. They say the facts that smoked foods, unlike tobacco, are not inhaled and that the flavouring is present in small doses mean there is no realistic risk.

Critics add that the ban will not cover traditionally smoked foods, which are likely to contain the same chemicals in equal or greater quantities.

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