The already delayed childhood obesity strategy will not be published until the summer, the government has said, and campaigners say it is unlikely to include a sugar tax.
From a purely pragmatic view, sin taxes really do not work. The Danish discovered this with their fat tax. People will work around it – or, if not, simply pay it and carry on as before. From the moral perspective, there is no place for sin taxes as it is not the place of the state to dictate or influence in any way, shape or form, our lifestyle choices. If we make bad choices, that is our lookout. And, no, we do not “cost the NHS” as if this in some way justifies taxes, lecturing and outright bullying. We are given no choice when it comes to funding the NHS. If we did, some of us might just choose to look after ourselves. As it is, that lack of choice takes away any moral argument along the lines of “cost to the NHS”, for we are denied the option of not funding it and not drawing on its resources (yes, I know we can do the latter, however, that means paying twice, so the point stands). Of course, it is a gift to the totalitarian socialist mindset that sees us as merely worker drones who exist for the benefit of the collective.
Fuck the collective and the horse it rode into town on.
The news from the Department of Health will anger health charities and campaigners, who say there is an urgent need for action on obesity, including introducing a tax on sugared foods. Cancer Research UK accused the government of failing children, saying that every day counted.
They are not charities, they are fake charities. They do not do charitable work, they steal our money and use it to lobby against our liberties. They are not, repeat, not charities.
In the meantime, anything that spikes the guns of the nasty activists pushing for sugar taxes is a good thing.
Maybe – just maybe – politicians have finally learned the hard lessons from the enormously high tobacco, booze and fuel taxes, that, once they’ve imposed a “sin tax” on something, they then put themselves into the uncomfortable position of not, financially speaking, ever being afford to stop people doing/using the sinful thing which the taxes are supposed to “discourage” them from doing/using. Perhaps, at long last, a little bit of self-honesty has crept in and they’ve privately come to realise that, no matter how many promises they might make about directing this or that sin tax into fighting said “sin,” in practice they simply won’t be able to keep their grubby little hands off all that cash or stop themselves from frittering it away on all sort of other, much more fun and interesting, vanity projects which are closer to their hearts than fixing the health service, repairing the roads or improving public transport. Or – who knows – maybe their dealings with the rampant and overly-powerful anti-smoking movement has proved to them that giving in to these “charities” in the first instance is “never enough,” and one show of weakness in the beginning simply leads to ever-increasing demands for yet more and more restrictions, rules, and legislation and, of course, yet more and more “funding.”
Not just that, they are then encouraging higher employment in the smuggling community…
What about those of us that stay thin by moving about a lot? Energy drinks and gels are full of sugar but are an important part of an endurance athlete’s kit. It is hardly helping if the government taxes them to the hilt and puts the price up.
For ‘sugar tax’ read ‘I’m a stupid fat useless twat who can’t stop stuffing his face with shit’ tax
Can’t wait to see whether that CUNT Jamie Oliver sticks to his word and takes it to the street in order to overthrow the Government. Because millionaires having a tantrum about politicians refusing to impose higher taxes on the poorest people in society is ALWAYS a popular movement! Or maybe he’ll decide to go down the route of standing against the PM in the next election on a platform of ‘HIGHER TAXES FOR POOR PEOPLE!’ He’s already an annoying bastard whose profile far outweighs his talent, and a massive hypocrite who loves the sound of his own voice so he’s perfect Parliamentary stock…