Brisbane and other Australian cities have this system of restaurant inspection disclosure where a vendor get stars, but the posting is voluntary.

That isn’t what they do in Toronto, Los Angeles, New York and hundreds of other cities.

I’ve asked why the system is voluntary, and the answer usually involves a lot of muttering, something about not pissing off the industry, and co-operation.

Public health is there to protect public health. That’s it.

So while it’s nice that four leading Australian health groups have called on the new Federal Health Minister Sussan Ley and the Australian government to make the new Health Star Ratings system compulsory for packaged food products, it would be nicer if they included mandatory restaurant inspection disclosure.