Let’s hope that Gordon Brown was too busy trying to hex Cameron this week to notice the story about the Sainsbury’s staff member who refused to sell a pregnant customer cheese.
Let’s hope that Gordon Brown was too busy trying to hex Cameron this week to notice the story about the Sainsbury’s staff member who refused to sell a pregnant customer cheese. Sainsbury’s defence was that it might be bad for baby, but it’s just the sort of incident that gives our desperate Prime Minister ideas. For all Labour’s devotion to guidelines and chivvying, not many of their bossy initiatives have much effect on behaviour — warnings don’t stop smokers; tax doesn’t moderate our drinking. So why not introduce state intervention at the point of purchase instead?
It’s not difficult to imagine armies of Labour monitors waiting for us at the till, not just to prevent pregnant ladies having fun but to save us all from irresponsible, pleasure-seeking consumerism. Doughnuts? ‘Stand on the scales sir. No, I’m afraid you’re too fat.’ Vodka? ‘Only one bottle per week.’ Perhaps smokers could be insulted and harangued with health statistics as they leave the shop.
As it turned out, the cheese police in Sainsbury’s had made a mistake and infuriated the young mother unduly: mature cheddar won’t damage an embryo, especially if, as in this case, she is six months pregnant. Even so, the apology from Sainsbury’s was grudging: what could be the problem, it implied, if their intentions were good? Brown might not need to infiltrate the supermarkets, after all; that’s a perfect government response. Everybody but the customer knows best.
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