A Change of Guard

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Friday 23 December 2011

Press Release: American Presidential candidate fights Scottish village bakery closure

For immediate release

An American presidential nominee has entered the fight to save a bakery in a tiny Scottish village from closure.

Wayne Allen Root, front-runner for the 2012 Libertarian Presidential nomination and a leading light in the Tea Party, has backed a local campaign to save The Bakery, in Bonkle, Lanarkshire

The future of the shop is under threat because local politicians say its products are contributing to an obesity epidemic in the village whose population is less than 1000.

Leaders of Bonkle Community Forum say its selection of Scotch pies, bridies, sausage rolls, bacon sandwiches as well as fresh cream cakes and pastries are so high in salt, sugar and saturated fats that they represent a danger to public health.

The forum believes its products should be banned from sale and is seeking the withdrawl of the shop’s operating license.

Mr Root, from Las Vegas, who was the 2008 Libertarian Party Vice Presidential nominee, said he was appalled at the heavy handed attitude of community forum leaders whose actions represented a threat to the individual liberty of villagers.

“Where do we draw the line to the abuse of power by politicians?,” he said. “Will your business be closed next? Your home taken, re-zoned to make way for a development owned by the politician voting against you? Your job eliminated due to new regulations put in place by a politician who helps a competing company?”

Some 68.4% of men and 64.9% of women over the age of 25 in Lanarkshire are overweight or obese, higher than the Scottish average, according to the North Lanarkshire Council Diet and Nutrition Policy 2008-2012.

Earlier this year Coatbridge, 11 miles from Bonkle, where one fifth of adults are obese, was branded the fattest town in Britain.

However Dan Doyle, who is leading opposition to the move, said the forum had over-reached itself and should not be dictating to people what they should and should not eat.

“This action is an infringement of personal liberty,” he said. “Why should an elected body take it upon itself to dictate what is healthy or otherwise for is and our fellow citizens to eat?

"Surely that is a matter of individual choice? In our view the closure of the Bonkle Bakery is merely the first step on a slippery slope that leads inexorably to enforced sterilisation and the burning of books.”

Farquhar Fox, convener of the forum, said a public information campaign, urging people to eat more healthily, had failed and that action was required to reduce the growing burden that overweight people were placing on National Health Service resources.

“A sausage roll contains 28 grams of fat, a third of an adult’s daily recommended intake in just a few bites,” said Fox. “If you had chips with that, you would be close to reaching two thirds of your daily fat allowance and an apple turnover with a swirl of squirty cream for afters would tip you over the edge.

“To burn off the calories taken on by eating an average lunch from The Bakery would require a seven hour walk.

“People have been given the opportunity to show restraint and they have failed to do so. The only responsible course of action is to seek the withdrawl of The Bakery’s food license.”

The issue will be decided at the next full meeting of the community forum on January 5. The decision to revoke The Bakery’s trading license rests ultimately with North Lanarkshire Council.

While Mr Fox admitted the forum could not force the local authority to act, a resolution passed by a majority of its members, he said, would represent a clear mandate that North Lanarkshire councilors could not ignore.

Notes to Editors

• Bonkle Community forum is an elected body representing the interests of the local community.

• It was established in 1985 and comprises 12 members.

• NHS Lanarkshire has admitted that it will not meet a Scottish Government target to combat child obesity. In 2008/09, some 15% of pupils (6300) in primary one classes in 2008 were overweight.

• In 2009 Dr David Walker, a GP in Lanarkshire, called for a tax to be introduced on chocolate at the British Medical Association’s Scottish Conference.

• Dr Walker warned that chocolate had lost its status as a "treat" and had become a harmful addition for some people. Describing obesity as a "mushrooming" problem, he said Scotland risked heading the same way as the United States

For more information contact Dan Doyle on Doyledan5@gmail.com or telephone +44 (0) 7587 814450

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

what a fuckin communist politican.as long as the stuff they using is legal you have no right to shut the shop.