Saturday 5 January 2013

"We think people know there's sugar in them..."

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Here we go again. A few weeks after Denmark realised it's 'fat tax' was stupid and unworkable, Britain's Labour Party decides it would be a super wheeze to take the same approach with sugar. Except they're cleverer - the evil word "tax" is avoided and instead we'll have a nice friendly cap. At 30% sugar content - anything more than this and "whooosh", off the shelves.

Mr Burnham highlighted the case of children’s breakfast cereals. Many are over one third sugar by weight.
Examples of high sugar cereals include Kellogg's Frosties (37.0g per 100g), Asda and Tesco Choco Snaps (both 36.1g) and Honey Monster Sugar Puffs (35g). 

Frosties, Sugar Puffs and so forth have been around for 60 years and, as Kellogg's say:  "we think people know there’s sugar in them – we’re not hiding it." So why all the excitement now - I guess there's another scare about how all our kids are lard buckets because of fast food, chocolate and evil food manufacturers who sneak nasty sugar into sweets. That and advertising of course.

Maybe Burnham will be banning the sale of granulated sugar - unless you get a baking licence or something - so we don't pile great spoonfuls onto our cornflakes? How about banning jam - those crafty mums might give the kids bread and jam (worse it might be white bread)!. It might even be that this jam and sugar will go into making something called a "cake" - more sugar loaded goodies making our children ever fatter!

Now let me explain something to Mr Burnham (and to the fussbuckets in my party who are kicking themselves for not thinking of this particular ban first), there's this thing called parental responsibility. You know, the thing where you as a responsible adult in charge of your children, regulate what they eat and drink. If children are fat it is nearly always because their parents give them too much to eat.
 
We had a slim child staying over New Year who loved her bowl of Coco Pops (as did my now grown up son) - what Burnham and the other nannying fussbuckets are saying is that this little girl can't have this pleasure because some other parents have fat children.

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I have a very slim child who suffered a reaction to many foods when she was younger. The dietician advised us to eat children's cereals. Although they are higher in sugar they have added vitamins & calcium in them too, so supplementing a child's diet. As long as we are aware of sugar content of all foods we eat throughout the day & ensure everything is in moderation, surely the sugary cereal is not the issue.... Chocolate, biscuits, crisps, sweets, cake.......these are the real culprits in childhood obesity! As a teacher, I see what children bring in their packed lunches. You can spot which belong to the overweight kids!