Scotland's First Minister is trying to improve our eating habits. The
Sunday Herald welcomes this dietary intrusion:
Mr McConnell, who comes to this issue with the Damascene zeal of a convert who admits that for eight years in his youth he never ate a vegetable, is to be applauded for his efforts on the dietary front.
Herald columnist, Tom Shields, has been visiting Barcelona, which seemingly has yet to offer diners such homely fare as the deep-fried Mars Bar. Mr Shields is shocked and envious at how inexpensive decent food is in Spain compared with the UK:
I write this filled not only with indignation but filled with lunch. I have just had a three-course meal in a restaurant called the Calandria which means the Lark. It certainly is a lark. The large starter of a rich paella barely left room for the tuna steak with green salad. The waitress has just left a bottle of whisky at the next table with which an old fella is liberally dousing his large slice of sponge cake. Being on a McConnellesque health kick, I have ordered a piece of fruit for my pudding. I am drinking the red wine included in the price merely to lower my cholesterol level. The cost is five euros. I am pondering what kind of lunch you can get for £3.25 in rip-off Scotland.
Yes, that certainly seems to be a good deal. But the real eye-opener was: "The waitress has just left a bottle of whisky at the next table with which an old fella is liberally dousing his large slice of sponge cake." Now if Jack McConnell can arrange for this practice to be adopted in Scottish restaurants, our health would
really improve and he could face the May election with total confidence.