Pearls of Wisdom: Sugar Too Sweet For The Taxman’s Tongue

By Pearl Bullivant on May 13, 2016 in Other

The British government is set to introduce a sugar levy on soft drinks, having been shamed into action by celebrity chef Jamie Oliver. Knowing Australia’s love affair with Jamie Oliver and our passion for anything anti-sugar, you would think that our government would harness popular opinion and follow Britain’s lead. But, alas, pig trotters (in Worcestershire sauce) may fly. Australians may be obsessed with celebrity chefs, but our government is even more obsessed with putting the wealth of large corporations before the health of our nation as a whole. A sugar tax? How terribly unAustralian!

Admitting that soft drink companies contribute to obesity is like admitting mining corporations contribute to global warming; it’s a no-go zone for the government. So when the Australian Medical Association raised the possibility of a sugar levy it was only natural for the Minister for Trade and Investment, Steven Ciobo, to evasively announce that he is “not a fan of the tax”, while the “evidence based and informed” spokesperson for the Australian Beverages Council, Geoff Parker, complained to the media that the tax “is yet another step in the wrong direction to end the global obesity epidemic” and that “beverage consumption is a personal choice, not a revenue raiser”.

Geoff Parker would say that, wouldn’t he? What the hell did the media expect? Why did they seek the opinion of the Australian Beverages Council knowing that their utterances would be biased? It’s like Lang Hancock boasting to the media that the asbestos from his Pilbara mine was so safe that he could eat it.

Instead of providing soft drink companies with free publicity for the sake of ‘balanced reporting’, why wasn’t the Sydney Morning Herald hounding them with the famed ‘Fairfax-style’ of investigative journalism? Instead of paying lip service to soft drink companies, why weren’t they uncovering the unpalatable truth about these insidious beverages?

And why doesn’t the Minister for Trade and Investment have the guts to admit he is protecting soft drink multinationals instead of the lame response of “I’m not a fan”? Why doesn’t he have the gumption to display ‘absolute integrity’ (alluded to on his website) and follow the lead of the NSW Liberal MLC who openly admitted that the Baird government’s anti-protest laws were designed to protect “the financial welfare of the mining industry”? This admission may have made us squirm (not that I’ve detected any outrage from the apathetic masses over his statement), but at least the dude is being honest.

So Geoff Parker, of the dubiously named Australian Beverages Council, Pearl Bullivant is asking the hard-hitting questions that the Fairfax press was too terrified to ask: What the hell is the right direction to ending global obesity? And was Coca-Cola a beverage of “personal choice” for the Mexican people when it was being forced upon them due to a coincidental lack of bottled drinking water?

My beverage of choice is gin. It is taxed to buggery but at least it has health benefits; your revolting stuff has none. Admit the health consequences and pay the tax!