Another food fiasco!

I suppose given the dithering and polical double-speak from his Cabinet Ministers when the hot potato (literally) of GM food is mentioned, which seems to be every second minute these days, Mr Blair HAD to say something. And he most certainly did.

The Prime Minister believes the dangers of eating food produced by biochemists, which is what GM crops are, have been blown out of all proportion by the media, which will do anything to promote a story, and those tiresome Greens, who see anything from a kid's chemistry set to factory farming as a threat to the environment, the planet and everything on it.

He even went as far as to suggest there was no harm to human beings posed by GM products and he would be perfectly happy to eat them, which brought to mind the mental picture of the hapless Tory Minister John Selwyn Gummer who, at the height of the BSE crisis, marched the small Gummers to the local fast food joint and force fed them burgers, or was it the Sunday joint of roast beef, while TV and Press cameramen recorded the 'happy' event?

Whatever, it had little or no effect as far as reassuring the Great British Public that beef was safe. All it did was merely confirm that John Selwyn Gummer was (a) devoted to John Major and the Tory cause; (b) had loads of money invested in a chain of butchers' shops or (c) was a serious nutter. I voted for (c).

Dr Jack Cunningham, the government minister responsible for agriculture, fisheries and food, has faced the same dilemma. Unlike JSG and his actions over BSE, Dr Cunningham refused to commit hari-kari in public by eating a dollop of GM tomatoes or spuds. He answered a load of searching questions put to him on the telly by talking at length and saying sod all. A masterly display of polical body-swerving which leads one to the inescapable conclusion that the Cunningham doctorate was gained in gobbledegook.

Not so The Messiah. Prime Minister Blair has come down firmly on the side of the biotech industry experts who are adamant that GM food is not only safe, but of positive benefit to the human race in that it will be possible to ingest antebiotics and other germ resistant substances with your meals. Terrific. I wonder what effect that will have on my regular Sunday night Chinese takeaway?

It's not that I have totally lost faith in New Labour's leader. He still has that boyish charm, the dazzling smile and matinee idol looks. But it's his judgement we are (or should that be I am?) questioning here. And this is the same Tony Blair who backed Bombardier Bill 'I Did Not Have Sex With That Woman' Clinton when he bombed a factory in Sudan which, according to American intelligence (sic) sources was linked to terrorism.

Oops. Would a letter of apolgy suffice? How about a dozen free copies of the 'Monica Lewinsky In The Oval Office' tape backed up by a dozen signed copies of 'Ten Ways To Enjoy A Cigar Without Actually Smoking It'. No. Well, what if we send a shipload of GM food? Or several shiploads? That should go some way towards saying sorry AND easing the current level of starvation in that part of Africa. Hungry folk will eat anything. Everyone knows that. Especially those who are hungry.

Anyway, I am firmly in favour of a moratorium on the wholesale production of Genetically Modified crops until they have been properly tested, possibly by members of the Blair Cabinet. Not his family. The Cabinet. I need reassuring that they are totally, unquestionably, undeniably safe.

I have a daughter who has been genetically modifying food for years and the effects have been pretty disastrous on her husband. I'm not going to name her (daft I might be, insane not quite) for fear of embarrassing her or putting myself in physical danger. She might offer to cook me a meal!

Until she discovered the wonderful M & S food hall, the sum total of my daughter's culinary efforts had reduced her husband to doing a passable imitation of an anorexic. Even the wheelie bin had ulcers.

The young man in question took the desperate measure of trying to acquaint my darling daughter with microwave cooking, even buying her a recipe book for good measure. He gave up the ghost when she bombarded one concoction with more radiation than the collective force of the nuclear bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

She is currently seeking a divorce on the grounds that he spends more time at McDonalds than with her. I may well be in his corner on that one.

One thought I will leave you with at this juncture, those of you who have got thus far and are still awake, that is. If scientists can Genetically Modify fruit and veg by introducing the genes of one species into another, why doesn't someone better placed than me suggest to the Football Association that the entire England soccer squad be Genetically Modified with genes from the French football team?

I'm not the greatest judge on earth of a soccer match, but from what I saw of the recent 'friendly between England and the World Cup winners from across the Channel, the French are on a different planet skill-wise.

Of greater need (if that is possible) of improvement by Genetic Modification is the England cricket team whose abject humiliation at the hands of the ex-convicts and lager louts in Oz was little short of shameful.

It pains me greatly to have to say this but the introduction of some Australian genes by biotechnology might persuade the tourists from England that an overseas trip is meant to be significantly more than a sun-soaked 'jolly'. Winning a test series and showing some determination and resolve instead of rolling over, belly up, might just come into the equation. Please.

Yes. And pigs might fly. But given the current revelations about cloning and Genetic Modification, they not only might, they almost certainly will. And if any bioscientist is reading this (a long shot, I know) do you think we could do a deal with Tom Cruise or Mel Gibson?

Yours in hope . . .

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.