But according to this list of mental disorders as defined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders and the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, gender identity disorder is a mental disorder.

Of course, same-sex attraction was considered a mental illness until not so long ago and I expect that gender identity disorder will also disappear from the list in the near future, not because of medical considerations, but political ones.

Gender identity disorder (GID) is the formal diagnosis used by psychologists and physicians to describe persons who experience significant gender dysphoria (discontent with their biological sex and/or the gender they were assigned at birth). It describes the symptoms related to transsexualism, as well as less severe manifestations of gender dysphoria. GID is classified as a medical disorder by the ICD-10 CM [1] and by the DSM-IV TR [2]

So why are major physical changes undertaken because of a mental condition? Surely it would be better for the patient to have the underlying mental issues dealt with?

Some authorities do not classify gender dysphoria as a mental illness, including the NHS which describes it as “a condition for which medical treatment is appropriate in some cases.”[4]

The NHS is, of course, a fully paid-up member of the political correctness agenda. I have noticed lately that ‘transphobia’ is the latest weapon in the PC Brigade’s armoury.

Thousands of people get all sorts of unnecessary operations every year, like nose jobs and breast enlargements, but these are carried out, not to improve physical health, but because, mentally, the patients have problems with the way they look.

Here is one I hadn’t heard of before: Avoidant personality disorder. Basically, if you are a private sort of person who prefers to keep himself to himself, you might be considered to have a mental disorder.

The danger is that today a person can be ’sectioned’ under the Mental Health Act and thus deprived of their liberty. The Soviet Union’s political abuse of psychiatry is well known,

[Abuse of psychiatry is] a means of ‘neutralizing’ healthy people who are regarded as a threat to the existing political system, by admission to a psychiatric hospital, thus damaging their power and reputation. This abuse has occurred in two large countries, the Soviet Union and China, both under totalitarian rule, where public dissent was disapproved and often punished, though in other respects they are different.

There are people out there who want ‘homophobia’ classed as a mental illness. I suppose that would complete the “Gay Rights” agenda.

It seems that just about anything has the potential of being reclassified as a mental illness to silence opposition, including climate change “denial,”

At the University of the West of England in Bristol this weekend, a conference of “eco-psychologists”, led by a professor, are solemnly exploring the notion that “climate change denial” should be classified as a form of “mental disorder”.

The more that we become absorbed into the EUSSR the bigger the danger these corrupt and intolerant politicians and ’scientists’ become. The future is clear. Just as preachers have already been getting questioned and even arrested for not being PC, the same will happen with opposition in other areas, so you’d better kuckle down and accept everything that is spoon-fed to you by the government and the BBC.

And a familiar excuse these days for bad behaviour is that the culprit has been diagnosed with some mental disorder. Poor behaviour is now sometimes excused because the person has a disorder, such as ADHD. I see that adolescent antisocial behavior and adult antisocial behavior ar also on the on the list.

I know that mental problems can negatively affect a person’s behaviour, but I am also aware that the more everyday conditions that can be turned into “disorders” means an ever-increasing range of ‘treatments’ from Big Pharma, who now take over in some areas where common sense once prevailed. The loss of proper discipline in recent years (and probably also the increased number of children raised outside of stable families) has clearly increased behavioural problems among the young. Anti-psychotic drugs like Ritalin are now being prescribed to thousands of children. An article in today’s Mail suggests that coffee is just as effective.

When we read that 38% of the people in Europe have mental health problems, is this reliable or based on incorrect diagnoses?

When we further read that,

Some big drug companies are backing away from investment in research on how the brain works and affects behaviour, putting the onus on governments and health charities to stump up funding for neuroscience.

Is it because they know they are onto a good thing? Are they really just modern-day snake-oil salesmen?

Can you answer my question, what IS a mental disorder?

Is it whatever the government decides? Is it whatever society decides? Is it whatever the pharmaceutical corporations decide?

Is psychiatric diagnosis any more reliable than it was in Victorian times?

The King of the Game Shows should have been on the checkout.

I’ve been in a lot of pain the past couple of days and thought I’d better stock up on more painkillers. It’s nothing terminal.

You know how they package them in boxes of just sixteen pills these days? Well, I picked up three packets of different painkillers in the local Morrison’s supermarket this afternoon, including one I hadn’t tried before just in case it is more effective than the ones I am used to, and was told by the young lad at the checkout that I was only allowed to buy two of them, so I had to choose which one to reject.

My protestation that I am an adult was to no avail (if the wrinkles weren’t a dead giveaway).

So, I was presented with a “make your mind up time” in which, after considering my needs, I chose to turn down the own brand ibuprofen, which is the one I haven’t tried before. I was half expecting to be asked, “Is that your final answer?”

The checkout experience started to resemble a cheap game show. I stopped short of asking if I could phone a friend or ask the audience (the people queuing behind me).

If Bob Monkhouse had been on the checkout, he would likely have said, “In Bingo lingo clickety-clicks, it’s time to take your pick of the six.”

Or in this case, perhaps, “Banning Nanny won’t leave you be, it’s time to take your pick of the three.”

It could have been worse. I might have walked away with just Dusty Bin, or BFH.

P.S. It helps if you’re a telly addict over a certain age to understand what I’m going on about.

Ever wondered how many calories are in your food when you dine out?

No. Never.

Or in the snack you’ve just chosen in a vending machine? Or indeed your early morning latte?

Now you’re getting silly.

Well whether you have or not makes no difference.

Thought not.

Because the FDA are now proposing that the amount of calories on each item on a menu be clearly posted for customers to see.

Under the new labelling requirements, restaurant chains, bakeries, grocery stores, convenience stores, coffee chains and even vending machines will have to clearly post the amount of calories in each item.

The calorie counts will apply to an estimated 280,000 establishments required as part of a health overhaul legislation signed into law last year.

This will add even more strain to the catering industry. For example, in the UK, restaurant owners already need to check the temperature of their fridges four times a day and keep records. There is a local butcher who admits to checking his a couple of times a week and inventing all the other numbers, so I would trust his calorie estimates as far as I could throw one of his fridges.

They are designed to give restaurant diners information that has long been available on packaged goods cooked at home.

Which I don’t look at. And anyway, a mass-produced, pre-packaged meal can be reliably measured. In a restaurant or cafe, the size of portions will vary, especially if there is more than one chef. Some things, like fish, come in different sizes. Some restaurants put dishes of chips and veg on the table for everyone to dip into. If there is a large group of people, food will probably end up being passed around: “does anyone want my onion rings?”

The move is the latest in a series of changes to battle the nation’s epidemic of obesity.

FDA deputy commissioner for foods Mike Taylor said: ‘We’ve got a huge obesity problem in this country and its due in part to excess calorie consumption outside the home.

‘We see this as part of the overall effort to fight obesity.’

A California law requiring chain restaurants to display calorie counts has been in effect since January, but many counties have put off enforcing the regulation until the release of the federal guidelines.

Although public health and nutrition specialists welcomed the new rules, few suggested that they would make a substantial difference in the epidemic of overeating that adds an estimated $150billion a year to the nation’s medical bill.

I get so tired of reading these (probably made up) figures. Do they think anyone is going to change their lifestyle because unimaginable amounts of money are quoted? People tend to change because they want to – and especially when they have encouragement and support. When I lived in south-east London in the mid-90s, I tried to get help for my alcohol addiction. The first port of call for help was nearly always the GP. I found them generally unhelpful and uncaring, but one in particular – a very fat lady, as it happens – seemed like she was in the wrong job. She so looked down on me because she could smell drink on me that she made me feel worthless and frustrated. She finished the consultation (or ‘insultation,’ more like) by asking if I was going to drink less. I was so annoyed that I told her I was going to carry on drinking, and walked out. She put me off seeking help again for about a year as I recall.

The rate of obesity has more than doubled over the last 40 years. In 1971, an estimated 14.5 per cent of adults in the U.S. were obese, compared with about 35 per cent in 2008.

But haven’t Americans always eaten a lot? I suspect there is a lot more than just the number of calories in the equation. Exercise, or lack of, is obviously a factor for many.

On the rare occasion that I do look at the calorie count on the packaging of a product, it is on ready meals. If there are only three or four hundred calories then I don’t see the point in buying it. I’m still going be hungry and will end up pigging out on biscuits, cake and crisps. Could these “healthy meals” which wouldn’t fill a cat actually be doing more harm than good? Who wants to feel hungry all evening? Who’s not going to snack?

And if the FDA really cared about public health, the first thing they would do is outlaw aspartame. Over 80% of the complains that the FDA receives are said to be aspartame related. Despite being an artificial sweetener, it is claimed that it causes obesity (among dozens of other things).

When I stayed in France for a week in 2003, one thing I noticed when eating out was that although the portions were smaller, the food was tastier and more interesting and varied than we are used to in the UK. The smaller amounts entertained the palate sufficiently to satisfy me. I suppose the enjoyment was in the actual eating, whereas the bland offerings we tend to get in this country mean that the enjoyment is achieved mainly through feeling “stuffed.”

Which is probably why this looks so good.

It is clear that the social changes of the past few decades have seen us spending less time preparing good healthy meals and then sitting down as a family to eat slowly in a relaxed atmosphere. I know that sometimes I can sit in front of the telly and shovel in my dinner and not experience the joy of eating. I was only eating to feel full. I was concentrating on whatever I was watching and probably wouldn’t have noticed if I’d eaten a slug along with the lettuce.

The answer is not yet more facts and figures on food, which we nearly all ignore, but to start eating proper food and enjoy the taste. Our eating seems to be like our drinking – we don’t do it for the taste as much as for the auxiliary effects from overeating/drinking.

I have rolling tobacco, pipe tobacco and a pack of Henri Winterman’s Half Coronas. That should allow almost continuous smoke production throughout the day. If it’s fine I’ll fire up the chimenea too.

Our local weekly paper came out yesterday and contains a full-page “Smoking Feature.” There are two articles, plus an advert from “Healthier Scotland” part of the Scottish “Government”.

The first article’s headline is “New smoking laws to come into force”.

New laws are coming into force on 1 April 2011 which will affect around 47,000 under 18s in Scotland.

The new laws will also have consequences for the general public.

As of 1 April it will be an offence for:

Anyone under 18 to buy or attempt to buy tobacco products or cigarette papers.

Anyone under 18 who is in possession of tobacco products or cigarette papers in a public place to fail to comply with a request from the police to surrender these items or to supply a name and address.

Anyone 18 or over to buy tobacco products on behalf of anyone under 18.

And there is an extra warning to retailers – they must sign up to the Scottish Tobacco Retailer Register by 1st October or it will be illegal for them to sell tobacco, and those found to be selling tobacco “illegally” could be fined up to £20,000 and sent to prison for six months.

The other article is, “Youngsters urge smokers to put out their cigarettes.”

The children took part in a Smokefree Homes pilot project aimed at reducing their exposure to second hand smoke.

Smoking Prevention Officer, Abbie Wallace, presented Primary five to seven pupils with information and awareness on the dangers of second hand smoke in the home.

The Primary five pupils and their teacher were so enthusiastic about the topic that they decided to make their own leaflets to inform people of the dangers.

Some of the leaflets were so good that the Smoking Matters service has used some of the art work and literature to develop a poster highlighting the dangers of second hand smoke in the home.

The poster will be used as part of a region wide campaign aimed at reducing children’s exposure to second hand smoke.

And the youngsters are hoping that parents who smoke will stop and take notice of their message and put out their cigarettes.

Quotes from the pupils involved included: “I told my dad that the tar from the cigarettes sticks to your tongue and goes all black. He didn’t like that and now he’s down to one cigarette a day. My asthma’s too bad for me to ever smoke.”

The quarter-page advert basically says the same as the editorial.

I’ll tell you what I have against this, and that is using impressionable children to dictate to their parents. And what will happen when the Smokefree Homes project fails via this sort of “encouragement?” Why, of course, smoking will be banned in homes and children will be encouraged to report their parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles to the “Smoking Prevention Officer” and the police.

This item is simply incredible: Police roadblocks are being set up to catch drivers who are breaking the law – by smoking at the wheel of their company vehicle.

Council wardens and Essex Police will carry out random inspections across the county to look for evidence of illicit cigarette use.

They will even hunt for cigarette butts in the ashtrays and smell the air inside the vehicles in order to clamp down on the outlawed practice.

Whatever you think about smoking, you must surely admit that this is just total tyranny. It is clear that many of these new laws were intended to achieve nothing more than intimidate and inconvenience the law-abiding public.

I could probably link to hundreds of cases of police failing to appear at the scene of real, serious crimes, but frankly, what’s the point? You’ve read them yourselves. Even if the majority of coppers are still decent, this sort of nonsense paints them all as Stasi officers.

Workers were banned from smoking in their company cars as part of the Health Act introduced in 2006.

It’s a New Labour idea, perhaps via the EU. Well, thank goodness the good people of Britain made sure we got a Tory prime minister this time. It sure makes a difference: it’s got worse!

The culprits’ employers will also be informed and also be heavily fined.

One of my “to-do” posts (there are a lot in this category) is about the legislation which is aiding the destruction of British industry. The smoking ban is part of it. Not because smokers take time off to go outside for a smoke – a lengthy exercise if you work on the 45th floor in Canary Wharf in which case you might as well stay outside for a couple – but because they would be more productive sitting at their desks having a smoke, if my last but one post is correct that smoking boosts brain power.

Maybe the smoking ban is the reason journalists are getting worse?!

I spent five years working in an incredibly smoky office and that aspect of the job wasn’t pleasant. There was no ventilation, so by mid afternoon (and depending on who was in the office) the whole place would be filled with layers of smoke with nowhere to go but hang in the air making pretty patterns. But it didn’t have to be like that and it doesn’t have to be the complete opposite today, with a little bit of give and take; a dose of tolerance; a soupçon of common sense.

Of course, there have already been van and truck drivers and also taxi drivers fined for smoking alone in their own vehicles. I see that the madness has also reached Canada:

A police officer saw the 48-year-old trucker driving on a highway in southwestern Ontario with a cigarette in his mouth on Wednesday, and gave him a C$305 ($290) ticket.

In a world increasingly controlled by globalists, we are getting the same laws everywhere. I didn’t realise that some states and territories have made it illegal to smoke in vehicles which are carrying children. The most draconian seems to be in Nova Scotia:

Smoking prohibited in any vehicle carrying anyone under the age of 19.

Fakecharity ASH says,

In 2008 the Department of Health asked for views on whether the Government should do more to reduce exposure to secondhand smoke within private dwellings or vehicles. Around two thirds of respondents said the government should take no further legislative action although fifty-three respondents supported smoking being made illegal in moving cars and several respondents suggested there should be no smoking in cars carrying children.

If they cannot change the law via mob rule, as only “several respondents” suggested there should be “no smoking in cars carrying children,” ASH will no doubt use another tactic to achieve their final solution. Fake second and third-hand smoking data producing unfounded scare stories seems favourite.

I will give the last word to former Lord Provost of Glasgow (and Celtic director), Michael Kelly (he of “Glasgow’s Miles Better” fame) who wrote this on my Facebook page a few days ago:

Ever wondered why the world’s governments hate their people smoking so much? It is one of those questions which has bugged me for a few years now. They expect us to believe that it’s all because they care so much about our health – more than most of us care about it ourselves, but consider how much the ‘authorities’ actually care:

Public water supplies fluoridated against the people’s wishes and best interests.

Depleted uranium on the battlefield, and indeed, used in unnecessary wars.

Children given ‘chemical cosh’ drugs for shyness.

Elderly people suffering from abuse, neglect and malnutrition in hospitals and care homes.

“1.6 million youngsters living in severe poverty.”

And while the cigarette packets warn of damage to your unborn child, 200,000 babes are aborted annually.

But hey, that’s a “woman’s choice” and smoking isn’t.

The smoking ban has led to rape, murder and an increase in drink-spiking because people leave their drinks to go outside for a smoke.

And how about this from the other day: The Chief Constable of Strathclyde Police, Steve House, has said this of the rising murder rate in the West of Scotland,

Mr House again blamed the rising phenomena of indoor drinking, fuelled by the availability of cheap alcohol and the smoking ban.

He said one potential reason for the increase in murders was the reluctance of drinkers to call an ambulance when a violent incident takes place indoors.

He said: “We have seen more violence indoors and that may lead to a delay in calling the ambulance service.

“ If you are at a party and it is taking place in someone’s house and someone is stabbed, logic would dictate that a lot of people would rush to call an ambulance.

“In fact, the opposite takes place and people try to sort it out themselves by rushing to the bathroom for a towel.

If the towels haven’t been used for mopping up sick, presumably.

So, why is smoking really so hated by the world’s governments? Is it, as suggested by Frank, because smoking boosts brain power?

Nicotine makes its consumers focus better and think faster and concentrate longer. Studies have shown that nicotine makes the brain work 10-30% more efficiently in a number of areas.

Nicotine has a significant positive impact in the areas of motor skills, attention, focus, speed and memory.

If this is true, and when the agenda is clearly to dumb down the population, it would be completely logical for smoking to be demonised at every opportunity, through legislation and “education.”

This is also an interesting point: nicotine is,

an effective and fast acting drug, which improves the brain’s performance in social situations – a decidedly “social-drug”.

This is another undesirable quality (to the elites) in an age where we are being trained to self-censor our opinions.

And the ban in “public places” won’t be enough, because the commitment is to a future without tobacco (my emphasis):

If the health of people in Scotland is to be improved and inequalities reduced, smoking prevention must be a top priority.

This report makes a comprehensive series of recommendations intended to protect and dissuade all young people in Scotland from starting to smoke and to deter adults, individually and collectively, from encouraging or enabling them to smoke. Their full implementation should take Scotland much further towards a future where smoking tobacco has become a thing of the past.

And we will all live happily ever after, of course, by doing exactly as we are told – staying at home drinking our sodium fluoride, giving the kids their drugs washed down with aspartame-laced pop and taking them for their mercury-containing flu jabs.

We will dump our old folks in homes where they can be left to vegetate, so that we are free to live the lives we want, unless that involves smoking or going to the pub or expressing opinions others might find offensive or a thousand other things.

In this brave new world we will be working during the day for just enough money to live on, then sat at home staring at the telly all night, receiving our instructions from the State broadcaster. Then we will go to bed.

And they will tell us we have never had it so good.

I have just written a long post which I will double check after I have commented on a few things from the past seven days.

Norman Tebbit reckons that If David Cameron goes on like this, he could win the next General Election. On like what? Like saying that multiculturalism wasn’t such a good idea. Even Trevor Phillips said this years ago. Well done for catching up, Dave. But what will he do to undo the resulting ghettoisation? My guess is, nothing. Maybe nothing can be done to reverse Labour’s crusade to change society and “rub the right’s nose in diversity.” Maybe that’s why he has mentioned it now, because he knows it has probably gone too far and so he thinks that although he can’t won’t do anything about it, he thinks we’ll be glad that he has finally said what the rest of us have been saying for years.

I thought Norman was more shrewd!

Actually, his Spitting Image puppet just came to mind. He was a truncheon-wielding thug as I recall. I must find a video…

The EU, not content with banning many traditional medicinal remedies, now expects the NHS to employ foreign nurses who can neither prove their competence nor speak the lingo. Apparently, to assess them here goes against the EU’s freedom of movement laws.

Third World, here we come…

Remember when they started referring to the Third World as Developing Countries? I wonder what they are called when they become Third World countries, but on the way down to something worse?

Here is a petition calling on the European Commission to stop the Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive (THMPD) which is set to remove access to the vast majority of herbal medicinal products.

THMPD abridges the rights of each European citizen to self-determination in managing health. It goes far beyond reasonable controls over dangerous products, and enters the realm of coercion by limiting options for treating health issues.

The public’s access to herbal products that have traditionally been freely available must continue uninterrupted.

Indeed. I expect leeches are still legal to use. Yes, life in the new Britain is becoming a delightful mix of Third World Africa and medieval European feudalism.

Other important news, and the Speaker’s wife, Sally Bercow, has posed for photographs wearing nothing but a sheet.

Sally Bercow posed in front of a window overlooking parliament, wearing only a bed sheet.

The 41-year-old says it was done as a bit of fun, but has backfired.

In the story for London’s Evening Standard, Bercow said her husband John Bercow had become a sex symbol since becoming speaker in 2009.

“Politics can be sexy because power is an aphrodisiac,” Sally Bercow told the Standard.

I expect John Prescott would agree.

Contrast this with a real woman – Supergran – who tackled a gang of six jewel thieves – and won.

Here is the Chingford Skinhead in action…

A man who underwent sex change surgery to look like a woman – then changed back – says the NHS should halt all sex change operations.

Charles Kane, who spent £100,000 on operations to make him look like a woman, says he needed counselling, not surgery.

“Based on my own experiences, I believe sex-change operations should not be allowed, and certainly not on the NHS”, he says.

Those and many other treatments!

There are an estimated 5-6,000 transsexuals in the UK. Not a lot to justify changing the rules of society for.

The NHS in Scotland has spent more than £1.5m over the past five years on more than 100 sex-change operations carried out at private clinics and NHS hospitals in England because Scotland lacks the facilities.

A landmark ruling in 1998 by the Court of Appeal in England which recognised gender reassignment therapy as a necessary medical treatment that should be available on the NHS has meant health boards across the UK are required to offer transsexuals hormone treatment and surgery.

So, do these poor souls need surgery or psychiatric help? What procedures was the NHS not designed to fund?

Takeaways are to be banned near hundreds of schools in a new drive to curb teenage obesity.

Councils across the country are rewriting planning rules to stop junk food outlets operating next to schools and tempting children away from revamped healthier canteen meals.

Stop right there. It was the Tories that introduced these “canteen meals.” We used to sit down to proper meals, and if we were fortunate, this included caramel cake and custard!

The measures follow a legal ruling this summer which clarified that councils can take into account the health and well-being of schoolchildren when considering planning applications from takeaway outlets.

A judge ruled that Tower Hamlets Council in East London ‘acted unlawfully’ when it allowed ‘Fried & Fabulous’ to open just 500 yards from a secondary school.

Just 500 yards from a secondary school!! The shock and horror of it: there’s a chippy a little over quarter of a mile away from a school. Why, it’s almost as bad as heroin being sold in the classrooms.

Studies have previously shown how junk food outlets cynically target pupils with child prices and multi-buy deals, while promotions on products such as pies and pizza slices drastically undercut prices available in school kitchens.

I hardly think tailoring your products to the local trade is cynicism. What I would like to know is how small businesses with little buying clout can drastically undercut prices available in school kitchens. Perhaps because the catering is now done by private companies: another bright idea from the Tories, although this still doesn’t explain the drastic price difference.

And maybe the children want to leave their indoctrination camp for an hour at lunchtime!

Waltham Forest Council, also in East London, last year became the first local authority in the country to ban fast food outlets from opening within a 400-metre ‘exclusion zone’ around schools, leisure centres and parks.

Sounds like Waltham Forest isn’t the place to go to start that new catering venture. Best try another area, oh but…

Now dozens of other local authorities are adopting similar policies, a poll of councils reveals.

More than half of 50 councils in the survey had already revised their planning policies or were in the process of looking at them again.

Barking and Dagenham has brought in supplementary planning rules which include a hot food takeaway exclusion zone set at 400 metres from secondary and primary schools.

Councillors in Medway, Kent, are investigating restrictions on fast food outlets ‘operating near schools, parks and leisure centres’ after becoming concerned at rates of childhood obesity in the area.

School food campaigners welcomed the measures after highlighting concerns that a crackdown on poor quality school dinners was being undermined by easy access to calorific and fat-filled snacks in local outlets.

Following celebrity chef Jamie Oliver’s 2006 TV series, schools have introduced new menus, replacing processed and fried foods with lean meat, pasta and salad.

Why did it take a celebrity chef to produce a change? What forces acted against those school food campaigners in the past? Perhaps those in charge wanted to get on the telly to show how responsible they are.

However research by the School Food Trust suggests that measures to curb takeaways will take a long time to have an effect.

It found that secondary schools have on average 23 junk food outlets in their neighbourhoods, with some surrounded by 46.

I’m confused as to how allowing others to open will have any effect other than to prevent honest working folk from running a business. And is there a veiled threat here that long-established takeaways will also be given the chop?

Brent Council, North West London, is encouraging takeaways to use healthier ways of cooking dishes that school children gravitate towards when they come in for lunch or after-school snacks.

It is also investigating how fast food outlets near schools can be controlled through the planning system, with a report due later this year.

Control is always what it is about.

Councils with no plans to change their policies include East Sussex, which said it had instead concentrated on improving the range of food on offer in school canteens and promoting stay-on-site policies, where children are effectively locked in during break and lunchtimes.

Somebody can still think, then?

A spokesman for the School Food Trust said: ‘When children eat better, they do better, so limiting their access to unhealthy food around school is common sense; a survey for the Trust suggested that there’s an average of 23 takeaways for every school in the UK.

‘We’ve consistently supported local authorities that are taking steps to use planning regulations in making sure the hard work to improve school meals isn’t undermined by easy access to takeaway food right outside the school gates.’

Hundreds of yards away is not right outside the school gates! The explosion in the number of takeaways is mainly due to the laziness of the modern adult. Sales of potatoes are way down because people can’t even be bothered to peel them anymore. Banning new ventures within 1/4 mile of any school, park or leisure centre is going to deprive people of new local takeaways in large parts of most towns. The modern high street consists largely of takeaways, estate agencies and charity shops. The charity shops bring in little business and provide few real jobs; estate agencies are closing down (round here at least) and so it’s the takeaways to be targeted… for the cheeldren, naturally.

It is government that replaced healthy school meals with burgers and chips and sold off thousands of playing fields, but it is the small businessman in the high street who gets the blame for the childhood obesity ‘epidemic’.

In the 70s, we had good quality school meals at a price our parents were willing to pay. Then the politicians decided to play games with our health. Now the chip shop owners get the blame. A further nail in the high street’s coffin?

Parents who smoke in cars in front of small children are “committing a form of child abuse”.

My parents smoked in the car. I wouldn’t say that it thrilled me, but abuse? I think not. With the windows open, most of the smoke was expelled, otherwise my dad wouldn’t have been able to see where he was going.

That would have been dangerous, I admit.

It would also have been dangerous to ban him from smoking in the car, as gagging for a ciggie is not particularly pleasant and concentration is affected. So obviously the government has banned the drivers of artic lorries from smoking in their cabs even when they are driving hundreds of miles alone. Clearly, the believers of third-hand smoke have been convinced that this bizarre ‘danger’ is more deadly than a 30 ton lorry being driven by someone who can’t concentrate.

Professor Steve Field, chairman of the Royal College of General Practitioners, has condemned society’s attitudes to food, alcohol and cigarettes.

In a letter to the Observer newspaper, he said parents had to take more responsibility for their children’s health – and set a good example.

He said irresponsible behaviour led to high levels of disease and early death.

This from the ‘health’ service which carries out most of Britain’s 200,000 annual abortions and kills thousands a year in other ways.

Professor Field, who represents 42,000 GPs across the UK, added: “I suppose the same people also smoke at home in front of their children.

You have to admire the boy’s flawless logic.

“Evidence from the US indicates that more young children are killed by parental smoking than by all other unintentional injuries combined.”

Now, where can we find this ‘evidence’? Of all the children I grew up with – and every one I can think of lived with at least one parent who smoked – not one ever keeled over and died. Now all in our 40s, none has yet keeled over and died. Of the 700 or so kids at my primary school and well over 1,000 at each of my two secondary schools,  I similarly don’t remember any deaths other than one murder.

Other health experts have previously called for smoking to be banned in cars when children are present, but the government’s recent decision not to review existing smoking legislation means that move is unlikely.

In his letter, Professor Field says adults need to take responsibility for their own health too.

Let’s be honest. Most people aren’t interested in following a strict regime the self-appointed experts deem will give them a healthier lifestyle. It’s just never going to happen. A good friend of mine is ‘not allowed’ to eat cake because of his cholesterol level. He says that I should get mine checked out. And be told I am not allowed to eat cake ever again? No way, Jose. I am never going to deprive myself of cake. What sort of a life is that?

He added: “The truth, which may be unpalatable to some, is that too many of us, too often, neglect too many aspects of our own personal health behaviour, and this is leading to increasing levels of ill-health and early death.

And of course, the aspartame and other poisons in our food and drink no doubt don’t figure. Neither do the poisons in the vaccines given to children. Now that’s what I call child abuse.

“Public health is a sensitive subject.

“It’s not easy to strike the right balance between protecting people’s sensibilities and delivering the hard facts about their personal behaviours that are ultimately shortening their lives.

“Too many people do not face up to the hard facts, as they perceive them to be an attack aimed, in particular, at the poorer members of our society, when it is impossible to argue on medical or ethical grounds, that such behaviour is acceptable.”

Why do people in the best-off areas live for a couple of decades more, on average, than those in the most deprived areas, like the East End of Glasgow? Especially when poorer people are less likely to have a car in which to abuse their children with smoke!

The blog post is entitled ’smoking contradictions’ and here’s another funny thing:

A mountain to climb. Easier if you're a smoker?

A lady asked to come round during the week to try and persuade me to buy some advertising space. She told me on the phone that she would be about five minutes as there isn’t much to explain, so I agreed. We ended up talking about a great many things in the hour and twenty minutes she was here! She has done an amazing amount for charity, including a trek to Machu Picchu, the lost city of the Incas.

There is a place on the trail called “Dead Woman’s Pass” where anyone showing any sign of altitude sickness is turned around and sent back down, as it can kill. Several people were told they could not continue the climb and every one of these was a non-smoker. Some were muscle-bound men who were reduced to tears at having to abandon their journey.

I don’t know why the smokers fared better, but she reckoned that smokers are used to less oxygen in the blood and so could cope better with the high altitudes. She said there were wee Peruvian guides running up and down and smoking away.

A word of warning though! After a whole day on the trip without a smoke, she lit up in the evening and after a couple of puffs, duly collapsed. She awoke wrapped up in a foil blanket.

It’s a funny old world!