Give us our daily (unfortified) bread

Should we all consume folic acid? Is it good for us? And even if it is, should we have a choice?

This "sleeper'' issue has suddenly blown up, partly because there isn't much else around but also because it's one of those classic cases of state intervention versus the public's right to decide.

Labour signed off this new requirement back in 2007, with then food minister Annette King calling it "a triumph for humanity and common sense''.

Those words have come back to bite her somewhat, given at least some scientific evidence that shows a link between folic acid and cancer.

I say "some'' evidence because the jury seems to be out on this one. There are a couple of university professors in Britain and Europe who are convinced there is a link - at least to the growth of cancerous cells involved in prostate and colon cancer.

On the other hand, other researchers say there is no evidence at all of increased cancer risk. And we all know that folic acid in pregnant women helps prevent spina bifida and other birth defects.

So it's great for pregnant women, and probably OK for everyone else, though no one's sure about that.

You'd think, wouldn't you, that it would be best to proceed on the basis of making sure pregnant women got their folate, and everyone else could decide for themselves?

Labour didn't think so, and managed to persuade the Australians to agree to this new food additive, though I understand a couple of states - New South Wales and Victoria - weren't that keen.

Anyway, this is the standard Food Safety Minister Kate Wilkinson inherited when she took office in November.

Up until very recently, the Government line on this seemed to be that it was Labour's idea and they were stuck with it - at least until it was reviewed further down the track.

Now, that seems to changing, and I sense that the Government is starting to cast around somewhat desperately for a way out of this.

Wilkinson got a roasting on TVNZ's Q&A at the weekend, and she's on Close Up again tonight. It's getting legs, as journalists say.

I thought the minister did OK on Q&A given the hammering she received, particularly from the interviewer, Paul Holmes, but she struggled to explain why it was she couldn't simply cancel the standard if she didn't like it.

Then Prime Minister John Key got dragged in, telling Breakfast on TVNZ this morning that he shared concerns about the new standard, and didn't think it would work.

The reason is you'd have to eat 11 slices of bread a day to get any benefit from folic acid if you're pregnant, and most women don't eat that much bread.

But again, the PM parroted the line that it would be "breaking the law'' for New Zealand to pull out of the standard, though it could seek a review - which wouldn't happen until after the addition of folic acid started next month.

That would mean bakers would have to dump all their plastic bags, print new packing that contained folic acid in the list of ingredients, calibrate their equipment, buy folic acid, add it to bread for a couple of months, then dump the bags, remove the equipment, and print more bags without folic acid when the standard was revoked.

That's just nuts. The whole thing has made the Government look weak, I think, and it was all so unnecessary. It knew months ago this thing was coming up, it knew the bakers weren't happy, and it must have been able to work out it wouldn't have been popular with the public.

It had ample time to come up with a strategy to deal with this before it became news, but for some reason it ignored it and hoped it would go away.

It hasn't, and it's only going to get worse for National unless someone - either Key or Wilkinson - knocks it on the head once and for all.

Given that the Government has now effectively said it doesn't want folic acid in bread, it has left itself with no option but to ensure it doesn't happen.

Anything short of that will make it look powerless and silly.