Keith Vaz, MP for Leicester East, said the promotion of sugary drinks is the “wrong thing” in a city where a third of children have tooth decay.
The Coca-Cola truck tour is scheduled to stop at 46 locations in the UK as part of the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Holidays Are Coming advert.
Mr Vaz said: “The Coca-Cola truck is not welcome in Leicester, and this national tour to promote sugar-laden drinks is ill-judged and unwise at a time of record diabetes and obesity levels.”
Coca-Cola has said drinks will not be handed out to children under the age of 12, but Mr Vaz, who has Type 2 diabetes, said the tour will still have a damaging effect.
Err, yeah:
Heal thyself, eh Keithie?
Holidays are coming? Not until next July-ish.
I hate that “the holidays are coming” advert.
Also my boys would rather see the trucks from “Maximum Overdrive”.
Isn’t Leicester supposed to be some sort of centre of excellence for snack foods?
One likely cause of obesity and diabetes in Leicester is the feasting during Ramadan once the sun goes down. Let’s see the oleaginous little git, who is not, I hasten to add, corrupt at all, call for that to be banned.
I doubt he became obese drinking coke. Is he banning supplies of ghee from entering Leicester?
I liked his bit that there “will be protests”. I’m sure the local Labour Party and activists can drum up some spontaneous demonstrations.
So he’ll be picketing Asian sweet shops then
‘The Coca-Cola truck is not welcome in Leicester’
Who made this cunt the king of Leicester? Honestly, there was a time when these utter utter tools would have been chased out of town for their presumption. These days everyone’s too busy watching telly or Tweeting each other to notice the fucking cheek of nonentitous wankers like Vaz. I can’t decide whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing.
“who is not, I hasten to add, corrupt at all”
He’s just a very naughty boy, eh?
Who made this cunt the king of Leicester?
You should try living in Scotland.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-34677788
Tommy Sheridan, well-known swinger and convicted liar and all-round thug, just succeeded in stopping a Tory conference going ahead because they weren’t welcome.
I hope you’re not implying that the right honourable Mr Vaz does too much coke?
@Interested, to be fair to the right honourable Mr Vaz (and to his entitlement to express his ill-informed opinions), the good people of Leicester have returned him as their MP for quite some time now.
BiG, says much about the demographics of Leicester and the red rosette on a donkey.
“the right honourable Mr Vaz does too much coke?” Is there a right amount of coke?
P.S. Can one still get Coke in those original elegant bottles?
I suspect Vaz speaks in the same tongue that Keith Richards does, in the sense of ‘Don’t do as I do, …’
Dearieme, yes, you can get the original bottles.
@ Dr Cromarty
The Scottish Tories should sue Glasgow Police for a refund of all police precepts paid by Glasgow Conservatives.
Never a bandwagon that The Oleaginous One doesn’t climb onto for the publicity. Pity the chairmanship of the Home Affairs Committee is conventionally an Opposition gift.
@Notorious BiG
He’s *one* Leicester MP, but even if he was the only one it still wouldn’t give the lying, greasy, fat fucker the right to make such de haut en bas statements. We haven’t yet reached the pathetic point where our ‘elected’ ‘representatives’ get to decide who comes within the city limits, though given the way the majority of us seem to go from juvenility straight to senility these days perhaps we soon will.
And the tooth decay issue would have nothing to do with availability of NHS dentists would it.
@ BniC
No, unless you can show a localised variation correlated with the absence/presence of available NHS dentists. Lots of towns have NHS dentists that are happy to sign up new residents on arrival in the town. Admittedly London is different, but all *my* tooth decay relates to three years working in an office where it was required that one brought in a box of chocolates on one’s birthday,
Rather amusingly, Vaz was meant to be doing a spot on this for Radio 2 this lunchtime, but managed to put the phone down an disappear at the moment the presenter started to interview him. It’s good to see our Lords and masters haven’t actually learnt to use a phone yet…
Alternatively, I wonder if it suddenly occurred to him this might not be a great vote winner, and getting grilled about it might not do him any favours.
presume not allowed to point out that Diabetes is much higher in people of South Asian origin and that perhaps the increase in diabetes in the UK might have something to do with the increase in that particular gene pool….
@ Mark T
Yes, because it is almost totally irrelevant.
Type 1 diabetes is linked to genetic factors and is (usually) no fault of the victim (such as my 5ft 11″ 9 stone brother-in-law, who has maintained a strict diet involving a staggering quality of self-discipline for over 40 years). Type 2 diabetes is incurred by people like Keith Vaz who eat far too much sugar.
All or almost all of the increase in diabetes is type 2 diabetes which has no observable genetic or racial linkage. So the gene pool has nothing, or virtually nothing, to do with it.