Today's Labour Health Recipe: Reheated Snobbery In Envy Sauce

Today's Labour "New Approach to Public Health" must be the most disingenuous and spin-fuelled document I think I've ever read, and that's saying something.

It reads like it was written in Islington by a bien pensant yogic chakra-chasing millionnaire surveying life outside their window with disdain and revulsion at how the unwashed choose to enjoy themselves. This, apparently, is what the modern Labour party thinks will chime with working class people currently deserting them en masse for something more honest. Elitist snobbery with lashings of lefty anti-business envy thrown in for good measure.

Do have a read of the document here, it's a dog's breakfast even before you factor in the spelling and grammar mistakes. But if you can't waste your time on it (and I wouldn't blame you) I'll save you the trouble by pointing out some corkers.

If the 20th century challenge was all about adding years to life, then the 21st must also be about adding life to years. 

As was much discussed on the media today, this is Labour's war on "alcohol, sugar and smoke", all of which are enjoyed by many many people. It's how a significant majority of us add life to the years we have on this planet. By deciding that these free choices are bad for us so we should be stopped from enjoying them as much as we have chosen to, Labour are simply "adding years to life", so how exactly has anything changed? Orwell would have pissed himself laughing at Labour's shifty and clumsy attempt at hiding that.

Changes to diet and lifestyle mean it is all too easy to lead a less healthy life than in times gone by, and we all risk taking on more sugar, fat and salt than is good for us 

It kinda depends on who is deciding what is good and what is not good for us, doesn't it? At the moment, we mostly decide for ourselves, but Labour want to change that. However, it's not finger-wagging, oh no.

[T]o avoid accusations of a ‘nanny state’ approach we need to set out clearly what we see as the proper limits to government action. If policy makers fail to address the ‘nanny-state’ claim, it could in the end undermine public support for making progress on public health. A negative tone, perceived as telling people what to do, can turn people off.

Would "telling people what to do" include, for example, mean demanding that they quit smoking whether they like it or not? Of course.

The ban on smoking in enclosed public places is an example of how big social change to improve health can be achieved with broad public support.

There was never broad public support for the ban we had imposed on us, in fact there was majority support for exemptions. Labour ignored them and wagged their finger anyway. Or, to be more accurate, their finger was wagged by the tax sponging quangos and fake charities which I often think must have compromising pictures of Labour politicians dogging or something, so obsequious are they to public health extremism.

It has been left it (sic) to Labour, from the Opposition benches, to lead the public health debate with the move to ban smoking in cars with children and proxy purchasing of cigarettes.

Debate? What debate? Public consultations are a sham and no legislation on smoking which we currently suffer was included in manifestos before we could vote on it. Which brings me on to plain packaging, because Burnham and Berger are ignoring the debate on that too.

In the face of prevarication from the Government, it was left to Labour, from the Opposition benches, to push forward the legislation to enable the introduction of standardised packaging of cigarettes

Or, to put it another way, it was left to Labour to ignore the largest public consultation response the UK has ever seen ... which roundly rejected plain packaging. Not to mention their adherence to public health extremists who perverted the whole debate by using taxpayers money to rig evidence, employ corrupt practices and lie.

This, I suppose, is what Labour would call good information.

We will empower people with better information and support to make their own choices, rather than the finger-wagging ‘don’t do this, don’t do that’ approach that can make people switch off.

No sign of that with Labour. Choice and education have long since left the building in favour of bullying legislation. By Christ! Labour are even universally opposed to e-cigs - a perfect example of how people can and are making "their own choices" - as was proved with the EU Tobacco Products Directive where every attempt at engagement was ignored and destroyed by Labour MEPs. The left-wing public health extremists who advised Labour then and undoubtedly did so for this document are still doing the same thing now by destroying "better information" and saying "don't do this, don't do that".

Towards the end of the document, they give a nod to e-cigs. Now, how do you think this is going to turn out, be honest.

We will continue to monitor the emerging evidence on the appropriate use of devices such as e-cigarettes in smoking cessation and take action if required.

The party which is advised by far left activists posing as 'public health' professionals are promising to monitor evidence? They don't know the meaning of the word. Their evidence will come from the same people who are promoting misinformation in order to keep their snouts in a lucrative tax-funded trough. The "action" will be to ban e-cigs, thereby removing the chance for vapers to "make their own choices".

The rest is much the same ... but often even more sinister.

The Government has an obligation to protect children from poor choices that may be harmful to their long-term health.

No, Labour, you're confusing the word "government" with "parents". Parents have an obligation to protect their children, not some Tim-nice-but-dim with a PPE degree who has never met them.

Whilst we are clear that the Government has a responsibility to protect and safeguard children and has an important role to play in tackling health inequalities, we are not in the business of telling people how to live their lives. 

Yes you are, that's exactly the business you are in. Who decided that alcohol, tobacco and sugar needed controlling? Not the public, because the public freely choose to buy these products.

It is not something done to people by experts.

No, it really is.

Instead, we want government to be on people’s side

Then fuck off and leave us alone.

If people want this nannying crap, they are quite capable of tackling the businesses themselves. The 21st century population has more access to businesses producing their food and drink than any in history.

Facebook groups, Twitter, e-mail, you name it, it's there. Unlike politicians who try to imprison critics, or 'public health' liggers who block us, consumer-facing industries welcome the feedback. The products which are on the shelves are not some evil conspiracy to make us all fat, they are there because industry spends billions finding out what people want to buy - they wouldn't be able to sell the stuff otherwise. The fact that these products are on the shelves is proof positive that the public want them, or else they wouldn't buy them.

But this is where the Islington yogic chakra-seeker comes in, you see. Just because the public has moulded what they are sold is not good enough. It is what highly-paid idealists consider acceptable for the plebs which is important, and that is the message Labour will be taking to working people in May.

Seriously.

Badly advised as they are, ball-gagged Labour gimps still feel that they have to give something back to the wealthy public health execs who have played them like a fiddle. Hence these disturbing footnotes.

We will make public health a licensing objective and we would like to include the Director of Public Health as a key consultee in the creation of a licensing statement.  

We will ensure public health is engrained (sic) throughout the licensing system so that measures promoting public health (which could range from measures such as plastic glasses and bottles to a ban on superstrength beer and cider) are included in the licensing statement.

The only possible result being to close down pubs, because 'public health' will never say there are too few. Remember that next time some Labour MP says he cares about your local. Definitely not finger-wagging, nanny state, or telling people what they can and can't do, now is it?

And straight out of the finger-waggers playbook ...

Health in All Policies 

We will adopt the internationally accepted ‘Health in All Policies’ approach – putting health concerns at the centre of our programme for government.

Yes, as demanded by the unelected WHO, the first priority of the Treasury will not be looking after money, it will be pandering to health extremists; the Department for Education will ensure children are given health propaganda before learning to add up (like prohibitionists from the discredited past); and the Department for Business will vet every profit-making entity to ensure they have policies on fatties, smokers and vapers while making sure they don't object to 'public health' demands which harm the economy.

Remember the days when Labour used to defend working class people against snobbery, disdain and bullying from a rich elite? It seems a lifetime ago now Labour themselves are the snobs, elitists and disdainful, doesn't it?