The government has serious work to do. As world war looms and the economy dives perilously close to recession, they have announced yet another bold and exciting policy to meet the historical moment: banning chips from school dinners.

Labour are bizarrely obsessed with directly feeding the nation, something that the private sector has done pretty well over the last few thousands of years

Labour are bizarrely obsessed with directly feeding the nation, something that the private sector has done pretty well over the last few thousands of years

We were told yesterday that ‘fried food including chicken nuggets and fish and chips will be banned from being served in schools.’ This will, apparently, ‘reduce obesity’. Pizzas and sausage rolls will also be severely limited, and desserts will need to be composed of at least 50 per cent fruit.

Now I can’t get nostalgic about school dinners. Some of the things that I got served at school put me off entire categories of meals for decades. I didn’t realise that salad could be a tasty treat for a good 20 years after leaving education; the memories of what my school provided under that banner were too pungent. Their ‘salads’ included a substance that purported to be salad cream and which still haunts my nightmares; it had a resistance to pressure that seemed very wrong in a condiment, sitting in a malignant lump on the edge of the plate. Cabbage, I........

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