The British government- only a Labour government could dream this one up – is about to offer a one-off payment of one hundred and twenty pounds to pregnant women to spend on fresh fruit and vegetables. The idea is to counter the rise in underweight babies that are being born. This trend is apparently caused by teenagers becoming pregnant and by others putting off having children till very late. In other words the government is trying to counteract a social and cultural change that it has been very active in encouraging itself, by offering a paltry sum of money that will do nothing to help pregnant women, but might be a boon to those who play bingo or like a flutter on the horses.
Even for Epicureans who are concerned about their fellow human beings and seek a measure of general contentment with life rather than red in tooth and claw, self-centered capitalism, this is going too far!
The so-called “Labour” government in Britain is actually a proto-Thatcherite regime that hides up its prediliction for rather shady businessmen and shady loans for election expenses and an attachment to almost anything proposed by the current White House, by dreaming up really dumb programs that appear to benefit the poor. I say “appear”, because, like so many US Government projects, they are usually window-dressing and lack substance. After a generation of telling the public that government is a “bad thing” it hardly surprising that fewer and fewer competent people are going into government service. Thus the failures of government are self-fulfilling prophesies. And these people wrap themselves in the flag of patriotism! Of that more later.