Dear fast food restaurants,
You must be so chuffed. I mean, look at you - churning out incredibly poor quality food that has unbelievably high levels of salt and fat, and you get away it. Why? Because the government is too damn scared.
If I was Prime Minister, I would go after you like there’s no tomorrow. A ‘fat tax’ would be introduced, whereby any food - be it from a fast food outlet, restaurant, supermarket etc - will be heavily taxed if it contains above a certain level of fat (especially saturated) or salt, depending on the weight of the food. How high would this tax be? Probably a 50% tax in addition to the shelf price, maybe moving it up to 75% or 100% in future.
The strange thing is that I don’t believe the government should interfere in our everyday lives, but at the same time the goverment has a responsibility to protect taxpayers’ interests. The NHS is already paying out huge sums to treat adults, and increasingly children as well, for obesity and weight-related illnesses, so the government is perfectly within their rights to start recouping some of that money. Furthermore, the massive increase in price of unhealthy food will force people to consider healthier alternatives, which society will benefit from enormously. Some people might be tempted to ban unhealthy food but I think people should still be given the choice of buying it. However, the cost must reflect not only the costs to the producer - it must reflect the negative externalities created by the poor quality of the food.
Just pray I don’t become Prime Minister anytime soon.
With a hint of hatred,
A.Tory
4 responses so far ↓
redandwhitestripes // October 19, 2007 at 12:17 pm
It could be that they are scared, but I’ll bet there’s a hefty amount of lobbying going on too.
Letters From A Tory // October 19, 2007 at 8:16 pm
I’m sure the food lobbying groups will be up in arms at my suggestion, but ultimately the government could get a lot of extra funds for healthcare, which would surely tempt them.
As with petrol and cigarettes, it may be that the government could raise taxes for other uses as well, instead of just trying to balance out healthcare costs.
N Dominguez // October 21, 2007 at 8:58 pm
The Tories won’t tax their friends in the big corporations like MacDonalds who pay peanuts to their staff. Down with obesity pushing capitalists!
Letters From A Tory // October 21, 2007 at 9:20 pm
I accept that most politicians are too chicken to address this situation head on for fear of upsetting a voter or two. Corporation tax brings us quite a bit of money, but imagine how much the government is paying out in terms of hospital treatment to operate on people who have brought illnesses on themselves.
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