Heath secretary, Andrew Lansley, has set out a ‘national ambition’ to cut 5 billion calories a day from Britons’ daily diet.

However, the announcement was immediately criticised by health experts and Jamie Oliver described it as “worthless, regurgitated, patronising rubbish.”

Faced with the growing obesity crisis that a succession of government initiatives on exercise have been unsuccessful, the chief medical officer and the health secretary, Sally Davies, issued a “call to action” on diet and pointing out that 10& of our calorie intake is alcohol contributed.

Lansley urged that people should eat less and eat more wisely, and also made promises to speak to the food industry about voluntary cuts in calorie content of processed drinks and food. He wants the support from everyone in the industry including restaurants, UK restaurant insurance providers, food suppliers and manufacturers.

However, the new plan, which Lansley describes as a “national ambition” rather than a strategy, drew immediate mockery from doctors and food campaigners. Oliver said “Simply telling people what they already know – that they need to eat less and move more – is a complete cop-out,”

He carried on saying “This whole strategy is just worthless, regurgitated, patronising rubbish.

“Any of us could walk into any primary school in the country and find plenty of eight-year-olds with more creative solutions to these problems. It’s a farce.” He called for the government to make a real impact and then legislate and finance it.

As part of Lansley’s criticised “responsibility deal” with food and beverage companies, he also said he will now be asking everyone in the industry to voluntarily reduce the calories in their products. The health secretary claimed that a 3-5% reduction in the calorie content in an average shopping basket would cut obesity without the consumer even noticing any change in the food they ate.

“We have already seen how we can move further, faster through the responsibility deal and I am now challenging business to help us make even greater progress,” Lansley said. “Reducing the number of calories we consume is essential.”

A third of UK children and 60% of adults are obese or overweight. Heart problems and strokes are increasing, diabetes is rising and overweight people run increased risks of infertility and cancers.

President of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, Terence Stephenson, said the £5billion calorie target “may grab headlines but is actually peanuts – 16 dry-roasted peanuts per person, per day, to be precise.” He also said, “The plan has no clear measures on how the food and drink industry will be made to be more responsible in their aggressive marketing of unhealthy food.”

Stephenson said that unchecked, obesity could be costing the NHS £10billion a year by 2050 and added “Suggesting that children in particular can be ‘nudged’ into making healthy choices, especially when faced with a food landscape which is persuading them to do the precise opposite, suggests this would be best described as a call to inaction.”

Executive director of Which? Richard Lloyd said that the government’s approach to tackling obesity was woefully inadequate, “The government calls on people to cut down the calories they eat, but isn’t giving them the tools to do so,” he said. “It must make sure front-of-pack traffic light labelling is used on all food products and clear calorie labelling is provided in all food chains.

“Food and drink manufacturers must cut fat and sugar, and therefore calories, from their products where possible and promote healthier options. But expecting them to do this voluntarily through a vague call to action is naive. We need a proper strategy which includes ambitious targets.”

A new guidance from the scientific advisory committee on nutrition, which was released with Lansley’s plan said that on average, a woman should eat no more than 2,079 calories and a man 2,605 calories a day. As a result of better data, this is a slight increase from a previous guidance – up by about 100 calories.

Davies said that, on average, people were eating 10% more calories than they should to remain at a healthy weight and that not everyone tells the truth about their eating habits. She said, “We need to start being honest with ourselves about what we eat and drink.”