Or more accurately, apple drinks. The Tories have made much of their commitment to reverse Labour’s 10 per cent plus inflation duty hike on cider.
In my interview with Goerge Osborne today, he tells me the move was “malicious” and “fundamentally dishonest” because “under the cover of pretending to be dealing with alcohol abuse and binge drinking - which is a serious problem – Alistair Darling introduced a general tax on the cider that very responsible drinkers have a pint of in the pub”.
Last week David Cameron also told me he wanted to target high-strength lagers and cider but specifically excluded Scrumpy and “mainstream ciders that people drink in pubs”.
“We were just going after the white lightening and that stuff that people buy from convenience stores to get off their heads.”
Most people, not least when the Wurzels were rallying to cause, thought all this was meant coming out in favour of “proper” cider. The cloudy stuff, made in barrels.
It was proof, we were told, of how the Tories understand the Westcountry more than Labour.
Which begs the question, why have the Conservatives produced a poster today of Gordon Brown holding up a pint of bright orange cider – WITH ICE!
No self-respecting Westcountry lad (I count myself among them) would ever drink cider with ice. On the night of the budget when the hike was announced, I went to the press bar for a glass of the stuff and told the bar staff to kindly remove the ice cubes from the thirst-quenching tipple.
Someone who was really on the side of the scrumpy drinker wouldn’t put ice in his drink.
The Tories have some explaining to do.
Posts
Only a git like Brown would put ice in Cider .
ReplyDelete