I've been reading the transcripts of various interviews with British politicians conducted by Henry Dimbleby and Dolly van Tulleken. They include Tony Blair, George Osborne, Boris Johnson and David Cameron, plus various health ministers going back to Virginia Bottomley and William Waldegrave. You can read them here. You might find them interesting.
Dimbleby and van Tulleken talk to them about obesity/food policy and want to find out why more nanny state policies have not been introduced over the years. Three things stood out to me.
Firstly, they nearly all said that they wished they had done more, acted sooner, been bolder, etc. None of them has any real doubts that people's diet and waistlines are something that the government can (or should) control. None of them questions the garbage they are told by 'public health' activists and dietary entrepreneurs, such as the fake child obesity figures or the demonic status of 'ultra-processed food' (Matt Hancock is particularly gullible in this regard).
Secondly, there is no difference between Labour and Conservative politicians. If you read these transcripts blind, you would not be able to guess which politicians were from the party that supposedly supports the free market and personal liberty. If anything, the likes of William Hague and Seema Kennedy are more statist and authoritarian than Alan Milburn and Tony Blair. It is a Uniparty and no matter you vote for, the coercive paternalists always get in.
Thirdly, despite Dimbleby and van Tulleken frequently prompting them to complain about lobbying from the food industry, most of them do not think this makes a lot of difference to policy-making. It is public opinion and the personal views of ministers that matter, not the paper tiger of Big Food.
Admittedly, the first two of these observations may have been influenced by the fact that they were being interviewed by people who are overtly in favour of greater state meddling. They may have given different answers to more liberal interviewers. They are politicians after all, even if some of them are retired. But I am strongly of the view that what they said to Dimbleby and van Tulleken is what they really think. I have heard a couple of these people make libertarian-ish speeches before doing exactly the opposite in office. Judge them by their deeds. These interviews make it clear that they would have been even less liberal if they had got the chance, but they nothing if not pragmatic.
Here is Jeremy Hunt, for example.
As a politician, one has to be mindful of how to lead on public opinion – you want to be slightly ahead of the curve, but not so far ahead that you lose credibility and are faced with too much opposition from newspapers and within the party. That is how we reduced smoking. Caroline Flint announced the ban on smoking in public places. I built on it with plain paper packaging and then Rishi introduced the full ban. Caroline would not have succeeded if she had gone straight for a ban so there is an element of bringing people with you.
Hang on. That sounds very much like the supposedly mythical slippery slope, the ratchet effect, the salami slicer.
Why yes. Yes, it is...
Work out what your 'next big thing' is and get on with it. Then after a few years, when people have got used to it, come back with another. Keep going step by step - it's the only way to change habits.
It's nice to have it from the horse's mouth that there is no point trying to appease these people. One thing will lead to another. Do not give them an inch.
Jeremy Hunt was also kind enough to confirm that shrinkflation is deliberate government policy.
But we are making real progress on portion sizes. I went on holiday to Croatia and bought a Magnum. 'Wow that's big' I thought. Then I remember that's how big they used to be in the UK. As the father of three young kids I am delighted they have got smaller!
A senior Conservative politician who can't say 'no' to his own children and who thinks it is a good thing when British consumers get ripped off? It turns out that there are many such cases.
