nickshanagher

There is a story in the Times today under the headline "Lidl fools the foodies with fake farmers' market test" showing that the "average person could not tell the difference between artisanal fare sold at markets and the products available on its shelves". The company set up a farmers' market in the east end of London and filmed shoppers who bought the products and then were surprised to be told that they were sourced from Lidl. For example, they bought mangoes at 75p and aubergines at 45p. The Times goes on to compare this with the prices at "the fashionable Borough Market" where they cost £1.99 and 70p each. The results will be provided to us all to see in a £20 million advertising campaign next month. This "news item" from the Times is of course not really news. It is part of the media story that portrays Lidl and Aldi as plucky little underdogs rescuing the UK consumer so that, in the words of its UK managing director Ronny G...

Three leader columns in the Guardian, the Times and the Financial Times demonstrate the battlefield upon which policy decisions are made as the UK government last week put plans for plain packaging of tobacco on ice. First the Guardian, which is aligned closely with the health lobby on tobacco issues. The Guardian believes that the government has been won over by big business (tobacco companies) on a public health issue. When Andrew Lansley was this government's health secretary in 2010 he said the evidence was clear that packaging helps to recruit smokers, the paper says. His government's suggestion that it should wait and see what happens in Australia is disingenuous, it says. Instead, people should think about Lynton Crosby, a lobbyist working closely with David Cameron (as leader of the Tory party rather than the country) and a supplier to BAT. The Guardian does not point out that the government's public consultation on the subject has not finished and the Depar...