A top councillor has called for health warnings to be put on junk food after new figures showed children in Swale are the second fattest in Kent.

A total of 20.7% of youngsters aged 10-11 are obese and another 14% are classed as overweight, according to data from Public Health England.

Sheerness West Cllr Angela Harrison (Lab) said the warnings should be similar to the ones featured on cigarette packets.

She said: “How can we work better to stop obesity? It’s a ticking time bomb - some of these kids just won’t live to be very old.

“Education is the key here and schools are doing their bit but they could be doing more.
“The problem is this tip-toeing around with them not saying they are obese, just that they are slightly overweight.

“I think we all need to work together more - there’s lot of different agencies but they are not working together.”

Swale is second only to Gravesham, where 16.2% of Year 6 aged children are overweight and 19.6% are obese.

Jon Whitcombe, who is head of Swale Academies Trust, said: “It’s very easy to lay before the door of schools.

“My attitude to this is that my schools take healthy eating education very seriously. We do our best to promote healthy lifestyles.

“To be perfectly honest there’s only so much we can do, there’s a huge parental responsibility and then you only have to look at the number of shops like Tesco where at the till they sell bags of sweets - three bags for a £1 - kids buy those.”

Swale council has introduced and promoted a number of initiatives since a similar set of damning figures were released earlier this year.

They revealed more than two thirds of those aged over 16 in Swale weighed more than the government guidance stated they should, making the area the worst in Kent.

The local authority has encouraged more people to get healthy eating advice and lessons from the travelling community chef, Mike Spackman.

In April, the Swale Clinical Commissioning Group held free health checks at The Forum Shopping Centre to check people’s body mass indexes and check for type two diabetes - an illness commonly associated with being overweight.