Vivienne Westwood: Clothes and food 'should cost a lot more'

The veteran designer complains that clothes “so subsidised”

Vivienne Westwood says that clothes and food are not expensive enough.

The designer – who is not one to avoid voicing her opinion – argued that “clothes should cost a lot more than they do”, adding that they are “so subsidised”.

She continued that food should also be priced higher, stating that “something is wrong when you can buy a cooked chicken for £2”.

“The world runs on debt and that’s why nothing costs what it should,” she said at a Guardian Live event in London.

Westwood has two brands under her name, her luxury mainline and diffusion label, but has long argued that the public should buy less out of concern for the environment.

“There are signs in my shops that say ‘buy less, choose well, make it last,’” she told The Independent in June. “I agree, fashion is a terrible thing, it’s all about tempting to buy. But they should buy less.”

Famously political and punk pioneer, the designer often uses her catwalk shows as a platform to campaign about issues that she feels passionately about, whether climate change or Scottish independence.

At her latest London Fashion Week outing in September, she sent her models out wearing ‘Yes’ badges, proudly showing her wish for Scotland to break away from the UK.

She more recently described capitalism as a “war economy, there to suck everything up for the people with the most power”

“Never trust the government – they never work for you,” she added. “They work for this terrible machine system.”

Earlier this month, Westwood launched her self-titled biography.