MINISTERS have snubbed an offer by Gillian McKeith, the diet guru, to lead an anti-obesity campaign in Scotland.

The Perthshire-born presenter of Channel 4’s You Are What You Eat, has offered to head a healthy eating taskforce which she claims could transform the country’s appalling dietary habits.

Under her plan “hit squads” of nutritionists would be sent into obese households to give dietary advice and wean families off junk food.

McKeith also calls for nutrition lessons to become part of the primary school curriculum and for parents to be offered tax breaks to complete healthy eating courses.

However, her offer to help tackle Scotland’s obesity epidemic has already been rejected by ministers, who claim that healthy eating campaigns are working despite mounting evidence to the contrary.

Scotland has one of the highest levels of obesity in the developed world. More than one in five of Scots adults are obese, while more than a third of 12-year-olds are overweight, a fifth are obese and one in 10 is severely obese.

Earlier this year a 16-year-old girl who weighed 34 stone had life-saving surgery at Glasgow’s Gartnavel hospital to be fitted with a gastric band to limit her food intake.

McKeith said: “We are talking about a lot of disenfranchised people who have not got the education. These people need to be re-educated and the only way to do that is to have a plan of action funded by the government.”

She wants to use schools as a focus by setting up night classes in nutrition. McKeith believes offering tax breaks to parents who complete the course successfully would act as a powerful incentive.

“In one school a couple of years ago,” she said, “ I created a parent-teacher-pupil monthly meeting, where people talked about food and exchanged ideas. Speakers were brought in and it helped the parents to understand what a healthy regime for a child really is.”

McKeith, whose TV programme regularly attracts 3m viewers, said she was confident that she could deliver a dramatic improvement in Scotland’s dietary habits and will submit her plan to ministers in the new year regardless.

Over the past decade £100m has been spent on healthy living campaigns in Scotland, including providing free fruit in primary schools and removing junk food from school vending machines. But fresh fruit and vegetable consumption has declined and obesity rates continue to rise.

Dr Nanette Milne, health spokeswoman for the Scottish Conservatives, said: “Gillian McKeith’s ideas seem very sensible and I would have thought the executive would at the very least have wanted to explore them.”

A Scottish executive spokeswoman said: “We are always grateful for offers of assistance such as Dr McKeith’s, but we already have a comprehensive strategy to tackle obesity and a full range of expert advice on diet and nutrition.”

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