Tax on fizzy drinks and curb on takeaway outlets to fight obesity: good idea or not?

[HelenMumsnet]

Hello.

Today, doctors are calling on the government to levy an experimental 20% tax on sugary soft drinks and to make local councils limit the number of fast-food outlets outside schools, colleges and leisure centres - to help prevent the UK's obesity crisis becoming "unresolvable".

The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges (which represents nearly every doctor in the UK) says it wants measures like these brought in to break the cycle of "generation after generation falling victim to obesity-related illnesses and death".

One in four adults in England is obese, and predictions are that obesity rates will soon rise to 60% of men, 50% of women and 25% of children.

The British Retail Consortium has countered by saying it's wrong to "demonise" fast-food outlets and it's down to parents to help children "build a healthy and responsible attitude to eating a balanced diet overall".

What do you think?

Do we all need measures like the doctors are suggesting to help us - and our children - stay at a healthy weight?

Or should we be left alone to eat - and feed our children - whatever we choose?

[Oblomov]

Whatever the causes of obesity, it is clearly getting worse and any messages the government or anyone else has tried to give us, clearly aren't being heard.
For 20 years we were told high fibre, low fat.
Now we are beign told no sugar.
No carbs.
No one knows whether they are coming or going.
And the answer to obesity? well it clearly isn't that simple, or else we'd all know what it is. And clearly none of us do.

[ATJabberwocky]

I'm tired of Big Brother telling me what I can and cannot eat/drink,

if I want to eat chips and drink Coke, I bloody well will!

They should consider making healthy food cheaper,

I also think that schools should concentrate on getting our children good grades in essential subjects and it is parental responsibility to make sure your child is not a plonker and eats chicken nuggets and pizza for every meal.

I refer you to this conversation:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1686838-AIBU-to-ask-if-your-10-year-old-can-make-toast

If you wont allow a 10 year old to make toast and boil a kettle, then why is there a surprise that a 18 year old cannot cook for themselves?

[DialMforMummy]

I think it's a good idea but only alongside a drop in taxes in raw fresh food.
tbh, I don't think anyone needs cookery classes to learn to cook, just read a simple recipe and follow instructions.
However, I must add that in order to cook from scratch, one needs to be equipped, and kitchen equipment cost money.
As someone else said, action is better than none.

[BeCool]

The sugar (and/or artificial sweetener) in fizzy drinks is just one of the many issues these products present health-wise. There's also phosphorous in very high levels which affects bone density, and caffeine for example.

Tax tax tax them away please!!

They offer nothing nutritionally positive and actually deplete our body nutritionally just processing them through our system. A healthy individual having the odd fizzy drink and an otherwise balanced diet this probably isn't a problem. If this isn't the case each fizzy drink adds a toxic burden to an already challenged and depleted system.

Get rid!

[RedToothBrush]

I think that what the Govt has got to do is sit down with other interested parties

Define 'interested parties'. You see, interested parties could include food manufacturers who have a vested financial interest and without their support it will be next to impossible to enforce any changes. As I've mentioned previously on this thread many have an interest in reducing sugar intake for example.

But they actually have no interest in making us healthy. Just making money. Health is just another marketing ploy. Which is one of the reasons we are all struggling so much to understand what really is healthy. We can't tell the difference between real messages and advertising messages because the lines have been blurred.

And get rid of this 'bad' food nonsense once and for all.

[sieglinde]

Rosie, there is a correlation between obesity and diet soda. Weird, but there is.

Not sure about the lettuce

But my point is that there are MANY reasons to tax sodas, of which the least good is that it will rid us all of obesity. It won't, not on its own. But it might play a part.

[Rosieeo]

Polkadot, bless you, you say it with the air of someone giving away some great secret. Talk about pointing out the obvious - it's not rocket science and most people who are overweight are aware of those basic facts. Thanks though :)

[Rosieeo]

I read something very similar Sieglinde, about the sweeteners used in diet drinks.

Not sure I can blame lettuce though

[BeCool]

Rosieeo it might be worth a Google on the subject - there is lots of evidence linking consumption of 'diet' sodas with obesity.

[PolkadotCircus]

I'd of thought the way they blow up the stomach with gas wouldn't help much either.Your stomach would never get used to needing only a little amount in it to feel full.

Sorry Rosie my post probably was a little strident.

[undercoverhousewife]

YES! Most things we buy attract VAT at a rate of 20%. There are a few exceptions that do not attract VAT (technically, they attract VAT at the rate of 0% and so are known as zero-rated items). These zero rated items are supposed to be things that are social goods or necessities eg medical equipment, books, children's clothes and most food (but not hot takeaway food or chocolate biscuits). Fizzy drinks are not a necessity (unlike basic food stuffs) and are not even good for anyone so why on earth not standard rate them for VAT? The administrative procedures are already in place for retailers to be selling mixed VAT goods (as mentioned above, some luxury food is already standard rated for VAT - eg chocolate biscuits, although not cake.) Save the tax breaks for food stuffs that are healthy basics. Personally, I would like to VAT standard rate all items that are very high in sugar, and, as a trade-off, get female sanitary products (which are a necessity!) zero rated instead.

[TheFallenNinja]

No, no, no, no. Fizzy drinks aren't the problem, the problem is overindulgence and lack of activity.

No problem has ever been solved by taxation.

[sieglinde]

YY undercoverhousewife. Totally agree, and esp on the sanitary products, by god.

[LackaDAISYcal]

No...take-aways and fizzy drinks existed when I was growing up and there were only rarely obese children...because we moved more and didn't indulge as much or sit on front of computers and video games all the time. And personally a 20% tax on fizzy drinks wouldn't stop me from buying them when I wanted to, or I would switch to an own brand variety rather than a name.

Not sure what the answer is though...

making people pay for treatment for obesity related illness?

educate children more? Bring back domestic science in schools?

make people watch embarrasing fat bodies on a constant loop till they get it?

stop the retailers pushing low fat but high sugar, "healthy choice" food at us? and filling our foods with aspartame etc and telling us that orange juice, or the talbespoon of mushy veg in my crap ready meal counts as one of my five a day.

[PureQuintessence]

Yes. Good idea. Also:
Tax on crisps until they are quadruple the price of what they are now, and feed the funds back into the NHS to help pay for the burden obesity is placing on the health service.

Yes to "Health tax" on crisps, fizzy drinks, junk food, tobacco and alcohol.

[Tee2072]

"making people pay for treatment for obesity related illness?"

I have type II diabetes, due to being (formerly) obese.

There was a man in my 'how to live with this horrible thing' class who wasn't obese at all, but who also had Type II diabetes.

Should he have to pay because his illness is considered obesity related?

How about people who do extreme sports? If they break something, shall we have them pay for their treatment? After all, it's their fault they did the sport and hurt themselves. Or any sport, actually.

Where does it end?

[newgirl]

Smoking has gone down since cigs got very pricey and the ads - a doc was on tv saying this yesterday

I know loads of people who have stopped smoking in last few years

so yes, i think if fizzy drinks get very expensive, people will drink less of them

[CaidenTaylor]

The sweeteners in diet drinks and children's cordial drinks are ARTIFICIAL ..lets see the new generation of cancer victims...have been warning folk about aspartame for years ;) wake up and smell the roses sheeple ;) xxx

[IneedAsockamnesty]

How many people now live in areas with no proper greengrocer or butcher or fish monger,if your lucky you may have a farm shop near by but loads of those are so expensive and do not reflect the cost of producing the food that it beres no relation to the normal shops we used to have.

Some one who does all there shopping in chain supermarkets will have limited idea of what proper food tastes like, fruit and veg is selected by look alone, fish is brought based on how much can be provided and you really don't want to know what is done to allegedly plain unprocessed meat and how that's picked. Or how old all of it is by the time its a available to the buying public. Even bread,how many people think bread is actually surposed to stay soft then go green?

We think we are buying what we want but no we are buying what they say we can have,its a con

That's what the big change is since the 60's and why its getting worse and has done ever since.

Obviously it would be very hard to revert back to he we shopped in the 60's but we could try and make it easier for proper food shops to prosper and be available to buy real food from,

[PureQuintessence]

Caiden, how to put this, you dont have to try to sound goady and patronizing to get your point across. And no need to offend people with name calling.

sheeple.

I would have been more than happy to discuss the dangers of aspartame with you, but not at that level.

[IneedAsockamnesty]

Oh and my children have tasted horse,nothing wrong with that if you know what your buying and its horse that's intended for human food.

[LackaDAISYcal]

That's why I said I didn't know what the answer is Tee. Those were suggestions as to options that may be considered, not what I actually think should happen. I don't know how to address the issue. And I'm speaking as someone at risk of type 2 diabetes, fatty liver disease and more from my own obesity.

[TheFallenNinja]

This would lead to a two tier snack system.

[curryeater]

Oblomov:

" And the answer to obesity? well it clearly isn't that simple, or else we'd all know what it is. And clearly none of us do. "

Oblomov, you are confusing contradictory advice with their being no answer. It's a common mistake by "reasonable" people - thinking that the truth must be some sort of synthesis between opposing positions - when there is no possible synthesis it is not necessarily that there is no answer, it can be that some of the positions are just wrong, and others are right.

Some people do know the answer. It's not conventional advice - which is low fat, high carb - but that doesn't make it wrong.

It's also about the fact that eating nothing, on occasion, is an important part of a healthy diet. All dietary advice seems to be about substituting x for y. How about just shutting up and waiting till lunchtime? (not aimed at anyone in particular, except, perhaps, myself)

Here is my opinion:

1. No, not because fizzy drinks are not of the devil (they are) but because this is a regressive tax
   
2. More particularly it is financially penalising people who are just complying with the dictates of neoliberal capitalism. If They (whoever They are) really gave a shit they would look at how consumption of all kinds is pushed, even to the huge detriment of individuals' health and happiness; and at providing realistic, alternative, healthier routes to personal satisfaction, whatever your class, whatever your income.
   
3. People shouldn't be financially penalised for not following Their dietary advice, whatever it might happen to be at any given moment, because They are very likely to be getting it wrong (good dietary advice is subtle and personally tailored ideally. Current conventional advice is terrible)