The Scottish National Party rarely misses an opportunity to bash England. This week, English whisky has been given geographical protection status, aligning it with the legal protection afforded to Scotch, Welsh, and Irish whiskies. While English whisky has long been a punching bag for the Scots over its lower quality — something that does appear to be changing thanks to some excellent new English producers — the legal change has given the Scots a new angle of attack.

The argument that prompted the SNP to declare, admittedly with some humour, that “Scotland’s still an afterthought” has some merit. Under the geographical protection rules, Scotch and English whiskies are subject to different production requirements, with the rules for Scotch significantly tighter. For Scotch whisky, mashing, fermentation and distillation must all take place at the same distillery. For English whisky, mashing and fermentation must take place in England but can be carried out away from the distillery where the spirit is distilled.

But this is hardly the full story. Britain’s geographical protection regime is not as comprehensive as those of many other European countries, and there is little obvious reason for this. The rules governing geographically protected Irish and Welsh whiskies are different again, while the boundaries of the five main Scotch whisky-producing localities can seem rather arbitrary. Campbeltown and Speyside, for instance, have boundaries based on electoral arrangements dating from 2006. Whether Scottish council wards were gerrymandered that year with whisky production in mind remains unclear.

The problems with Britain’s limited geographical protection for food and drink run much deeper than whisky. Currently, the UK’s geographical protection system covers food and drink through geographical indications (GIs), including Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) and Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) status. These protections link a product’s name and characteristics to a defined geographical area and specified production methods.

However, the UK only does this for around 100 food and drink products, and often without much detail. That small number includes the country’s distinctive alcoholic drinks, too. There are seven UK-origin wine names on the register/application list, two of which are simply recorded as England and Wales. France, by comparison, has almost 400 protected wine regions, more than 60 for cheese, and countless others covering the many foods and drinks that form part of its culinary heritage. Spain, Italy and other European countries with similarly rich food traditions have comparable systems. Britain is the outlier.

Quality is not the issue. British food and drink can rival that of anywhere in Europe. English sparkling wine, for example, frequently outperforms Grande Marque Champagne houses on taste, yet Britain’s geographical protection regulations make no meaningful provision for this. The closest designation is the locality simply known as Sussex, an area larger than Bordeaux, let alone Champagne. Many of England’s finest wines are not even produced in Sussex.

Much of this issue stems from a lack of framework in the UK. France established the predecessor of the Institut national de l’origine et de la qualité in 1935, which oversees its geographical protection system. It has therefore had the best part of a century to develop and refine the framework. Britain, by contrast, inherited its system from the European Union and has largely treated it as an exercise in regulatory compliance.

Geographical protections need expanding and codifying properly. Britain’s food and drink heritage deserves better than a neglected tick-box exercise. But rather than do the hard work, the SNP seems happier using the issue to take a swipe at England. What’s new?