Fortunately, they said more than that.

For quite a while now I have had the suspicion that the Government was prepared to ban chlorinated chicken and would do so with much flag waving, while letting other food below the EU standards in. There was a good hint of this a day or two ago where the government spokesman was saying that the chlorine wash is old technology and most US poultry farms are switching to a lactic acid wash. If that is true, banning chlorine washes would be largely symbolic, but if everyone's attention has been focussed on it, they could miss that it is actually not especially significant.

But the EU proposal would apply just as much to lactic acid washes.