Hobby Horse Campaigning

[Seabag]

Ok, seperating the campaigner from the campaign, as in Jamie vs The Soft Drink Giants

What's your view on taxing, making labeling simpler re the sugar content in soft drinks

After watching Newsnight, I enjoyed how aggressively indirect the representitive of the Soft Drink industry was (it went kind of like this)

"Could we not just have how many teaspoons in each drink" asked Evan Davis

"No, the public are confused by that"

Bearing in mind that one can is generally over the recommended daily limit, I wasn't confused. But when pushed furter on 'when is it ok to have one of these drinks, given that they are over the daily recomended sugar intake' , his response was less than clear

"As a special treat" followed

It was prickly and defensive I thought

Overall, Jamie will get a hammering no doubt, but he's up for it (for now)

But is he in Russel Brand territory here?

Me personally, i'm for education and information

[Loz]

Information is good, but 'teaspoons' and other vague measurements aren't very informative. Likewise with some of the 'traffic light' stuff you see. I think there should be total calories, plus total and percentage sugar and fat on the front of every product in big, readable type.

Taxes are fairly pointless as well. Paying ?1.20 for your Coke instead of ?1 isn't really going to put anyone off.

[david_carnell]

Loz

I couldn't disagree more.

How is expressing sugar in teaspoons not informative compared to doing so in grams. Given a large % of the populations still can't use the metric system (Dad, I'm looking at you - stop using furlongs) then a visable measurement that everyone uses on a near daily basis makes much more sense. You can still have grams too if need be.

Nor are taxes pointless. They discourage use and help fund the healthcare needed to treat and rapidly growing obesity crisis that is in no small way down to sugar consumption.

[david_carnell]

And while I find Jamie somewhat irritating from time to time, I don't believe he's doing this through ego.

I saw some foodie-types online laying into him yesterday because, SHOCK, some of his cookbooks have in the past used sugar in recipes. Ergo he's not allowed to criticise sugar. Which is frankly a pathetically weak argument.

It's a decent awareness raising campaign and good luck to him.

[red devil]

What needs to be established first is educating the public about how much sugar/fats/salts they can actually consume, without this info the argument about teaspoons or grams is irrelevant...

[DulwichFox]

Jamie Oliver and his campaign on sugar..

He recently said He would be adding 7p to all sugary drinks sold in all of his restaurants

in a bid to reduce consumption of such drinks.. Well that's just profit... ? Isn't it. ?

Why doesn't he just cut out Sugary drinks and replace them with Sugar Free drinks. ??

Think it's just Oliver on another one of his 'promote me' campaigns. Crafty..

DulwichFox

[Mark]

"The money raised by Jamie?s in-restaurant sugar levy will directly fund food education for children and similar health initiatives. This Children?s Health Fund, as we?ve named it, will be supported and administered by the charity Sustain."

http://www.jamieoliver.com/sugar-rush/#RyopmsBfsUUEhVbL.97

So no it's not profit, it goes into health, education and all things nice.

[miga]

I'm not sure where I stand on the sugar and fat tax.

Obesity affects the poorest most. Adding a meaningful tax will definitely discourage those with less money, so in that sense it should work. But, unhealthy food is also cheaper and quicker (you can get a meal for a pound or two from a chicken shop), and in that sense suits low waged shift workers etc. who manage to feed families in this way. By making it a bit more expensive people get taxed, but their habits don't change because the causes don't get addressed. Might it actually exacerbate the situation, further entrenching bad, but often understandable, habits.

[Loz]

david_carnell Wrote:

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> Loz

>

> I couldn't disagree more.

>

> How is expressing sugar in teaspoons not informative compared to doing so in grams. Given a

> large % of the populations still can't use the metric system (Dad, I'm looking at you - stop

> using furlongs) then a visable measurement that everyone uses on a near daily basis makes much

> more sense. You can still have grams too if need be.

Because one package will use 'teaspoons', another 'grams' and another 'thimblefuls', making comparison all but useless (cf per unit price on supermarket shelves). Are we talking heaped teaspoons (probably what most people think of) or flat teaspoons? Also, percentages are better and more informative, as people won't know if five teaspoons is good or bad. I know that certainly sounds bad in in a 330ml can, but what about a 1.75 litre or 2 litre bottle?

> Nor are taxes pointless. They discourage use and help fund the healthcare needed to treat and

> rapidly growing obesity crisis that is in no small way down to sugar consumption.

A 20% (or whatever) won't discourage use, except amongst those really on the breadline. Coke is already twice the price of a bottle of water, but it is still the biggest selling brand in the UK. You'd need to get up to cigarette-style proportions of many hundreds of percent to achieve that and AFAIK that is not on the agenda. Plus there is no evidence that it would "fund healthcare", either. It may fund anything - even Trident!

[david_carnell]

Except that legislation could define teaspoon (heaped or not) and force all fizzy drinks to carry that. It's not that hard.

And a % isn't useful if you don't understand or know how they work. If we are discussing a demographic with low education then that's an issue. Teaspoons don't require a GCSE to work out.

The tax would of course go into the general fund - it will be a goverment policy decision to allocate the necessary funding to tackling obesity.

[Seabag]

I'd like to see the recomended daily 'dose' by teaspoons or whatever, and then how much above/below that level that 'can' is. I reckon can shapes would evolve to fit

I can see why the industry would rather not do this

A minimum size label too, backed up with an fundamental educational programme. It's about time it was a serious part of the school curriculum, if it's not already

That said, when we go out for dinner and my boys ask for these drinks, we do a trade off. Drink or dessert? and they usually opt for the later. Not that dessert is any more or less sugar laden, it's the electing a choice that matters. We don't do those kind of desserts at home much either

Otherwise both drinks/dessert are generally off the regular household menu

I don't go with the sugar-free route either if it involves artificial sweetners, they are a whole other minefield. I'd rather develop a less sweet palate in our household

Good luck to Jamie, it's way easier to keep your mouth shut/head below the parapet

[????]

I agree with DC on the labelling thing - teaspoon, I know what that is

. I haven't a scooby on what a gram of sugar looks like.

I don't agree on DcS optimism about the state's ability to social engineer obesity with a flick of the funding money. All a bit top down for me.

[????]

And a well done to Jamie Oliver for this. The comparisons with Brand are laughable. Jamie Oliver is dealing with some medical fact on something that he has some reasonable knowledge and experience in. Brand pedals his own narcistic Mumbo jumbo based on a pick and mix approach to a bunch of lefty dogma.

[dogcatdog]

a what?

[uncleglen]

The medics have known about all this over-sugaring and all the other dangers of sweeteners etc...like they knew about smoking related disease in the 1950s. So (cynicism coming up) it will be 20 years before anything is done. All we get thrown at us is how much diabetes is costing the NHS (it's horrendous, my dad has it and the side effects are awful, and he cheats and says 'one won't hurt' and stuff like that..)etc and no one is tackling the root cause..there are still ridiculous vending machines in schools for example. Good on Jamie.

[DulwichFox]

Mark Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> "The money raised by Jamie?s in-restaurant sugar

> levy will directly fund food education for

> children and similar health initiatives. This

> Children?s Health Fund, as we?ve named it, will be

> supported and administered by the charity

> Sustain."

> http://www.jamieoliver.com/sugar-rush/#RyopmsBfsUU

> EhVbL.97

>

> So no it's not profit, it goes into health,

> education and all things nice.

BUT he is still selling sugary drinks with a 7p levy.... so still affecting peoples health and teeth..

Put the Levy on sugar free drinks.. and donate to the same cause. Educate people.. they will get used to

sugar free food stuff.

DulwichFox

[Otta]

I can't stand Jamie, but I think good on him for this.

I just wish he wouldn't be so preachy to people at times, and can quite see why a single mother of 4 on a shoe string budget would be pretty miffed at this rich boy telling her she's not feeding her kids right.

Oh, and what red devil said.

[Mark]

Point is DF he's not profiteering from the sugar tax, he's putting that back into educating people especially children about healthy eating, which we all agree is good.

Blimey, I just looked up McDonalds sugar levels... medium sized vanilla milkshake has 59 grams / 12 teaspoons of sugar / 66% of recommended daily adult intake. Makes interesting reading http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/ukhome/meal_builder.html

[Otta]

Christ, I must never eat another double sausage McMuffin. I didn't expect it to be good, but it's nearly half the daily fat intake.

Chicken legend not so bad, except for the salt content.

Mark Wrote:

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> medium sized vanilla milkshake has 59 grams / 12

> teaspoons of sugar / 66% of recommended daily

> adult intake.

SMALL Banana milkshake (the type you'd get in a child's happy meal) has 31 grams. Thank God my kids still accept orange juice!

[Loz]

Otta Wrote:

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> SMALL Banana milkshake (the type you'd get in a child's happy meal) has 31 grams. Thank God my

> kids still accept orange juice!

Orange Juice: 25g per portion.

[Otta]

But fruit sugar is a bit different to be fair.

[numbers]

Sugar taxes. FGS. No no & no.

[Loz]

Otta Wrote:

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> But fruit sugar is a bit different to be fair.

No, it is completely the same. Sugar is the same no matter where it comes from - a mixture of fructose and glucose. Fruit does have some very good stuff on top of the sugar (OJ a lot less so), but don't kid yourself the sugar is any different.