Junk, Food

A report by the Commons select committee on health contains a few uncomfortable questions for Twizzler Lansley to snigger at before he scrunches the document up, chucks it at Paul Burstow and galumphs his way happily onward. For one thing, the committee strokes its collective chin a bit over the Twizzler's idea of protecting frontline services, which seems mostly to involve demolishing frontline services; for another, the committee politely wonders from which of his all too numerous anal orifices the Twizzler has plucked the figure of four thousand million pounds which will supposedly be available for the improvement of public health once the present chaos sorts itself out and somebody or other is in charge again.

Additionally, the committee indulges in a certain scepticism at the Twizzler's brilliant solution to the country's ever-expanding obesity problem; namely inviting the fast food industry to participate in making policy. "Those with a financial interest must not be allowed to set the agenda," states the committee; it is not as yet clear whether Lord Ashcroft will give his gracious consent to be thus bound in his dealings with the Conservative Party, though I am sure Willem den Haag will get around to asking him one day. When it comes to the NHS, however, "people like McDonald's are the major players," squeaked a spokesbeing and Twizzler chum. "You can't just not talk to them"; and it would certainly be a bit uncivil to talk to them and then just ignore them, as the Government has been doing with such comparatively minor players as the British public and the British Medical Association.