The proceedings are normally rather dour affairs but, for one afternoon only, the health and social care select committee was sprinkled with a little stardust as Jamie Oliver and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall came to give evidence on the UK’s obesity crisis. The two chefs strolled into the room, took off their jackets and sat down. Lights, camera, action. The Jamie and Hugh Show could now begin.
“Hello Jamie, hello Hugh,” gasped the star-struck committee chair, Sarah Wollaston. It’s more usual for witnesses to be called by their surnames on these occasions, but no one was in the mood to stand on ceremony. The two chefs put on their best professional smiles: they’re used to the brains of ordinarily rational people being turned to pulp by celebrity.
Jamie began with a bombshell. Words that haven’t been heard around Westminster for several years. He loved David Cameron and George Osborne. More than that, he adored them. He dabbed an eye, overcome with emotion.
Several members of the committee shuffled uncomfortably in their seats but Jamie’s passions were not to be denied. Dave and George had been political colossi for embracing his vision and implementing a sugar tax.
Here’s one they had prepared earlier. Jamie held up a bottle of pre-sugar tax Ribena he had brought with him and 12 white bits of paper taped together hung down. One for every teaspoon of sugar in the drink. He then passed a bottle of post-sugar tax Ribena to Hugh. This only had a trail of five pieces of white paper.
“Change can be a beautiful thing,” he said. The soft drinks levy was a tax for love – a maternal kind of tax – not a tax on the poor.
“What do you think, Hugh?” asked Wollaston, aware that Hugh had barely been allowed to get a word in edgeways.
“He’s absolutely right,” replied Hugh. Jamie nodded approvingly. Echoes of “I agree with Nick”. On this particular show, Hugh was most definitely the sous-chef.
Jamie moved into the first ad break. Food advertisements were the worst. Pure evil, designed to tempt children into tipping bucketfuls of sugar, fat and processed foods down their throats.
But it didn’t have to be this way. Take Tony the Tiger, the Frosties icon, whom Theresa May had boasted of saving when she had pulled the plug on Dave and George’s obesity initiative in her psychopathic desire to kill as many children as possible.
Jamie had news for Satan Theresa. Tony the Tiger was sick to his rotten back teeth of trying to turn kiddies into chubsters. He was deeply ashamed and desperate to make amends. Tony the Tiger had seen the light and wanted nothing more than to bound through the jungle promoting the benefits of chia seeds and celery.
At this point, Hugh started to get in on the act. Forget Tony the Tiger. What he wanted was a real live Batman with carrots for ears. A superhero who could inspire people to go foraging for turnips. “I’ve got a programme on the TV about this tomorrow night,” he added helpfully. Not all ads are bad ads.
After Jamie had followed this up with an all-out assault on “buy one get one free” offers, Labour’s Diana Johnson wondered what he would have to say to someone who was hard up and was tempted into buying four sausage rolls for £1.
There was a hush in the room. Then Jamie spoke, a beatific look on his face. “A sausage roll is a thing of beauty,” he said. “It should be cherished.” There was nothing wrong with treats, but far too many sausage rolls were mere imposters. Rubbish meat just wrapped in fat. Out, out, damned Gloucester old spot.
Hugh chipped in once more. “Perhaps,” he said, “instead of selling four sausage rolls, the butcher could sell two sausage rolls and a couple of carrots.” You never know, it might catch on.
