[bleep_bloop]

"The draft suggested plant-based products should even be prohibited from saying they are ‘not milk’ – or describing themselves as ‘alternatives’ to dairy products."

The UK speed running it's way to become the silliest little land.

Probably this will all get watered down during debate but the fact this and the recent traffic proposals are even being suggested shows the current regime is at a dead end and have nothing better to do unless they start moving to the political centre or god forbid do something popular like closing tax loopholes or legislating markets that are actually scamming consumers like supplements.

[alibarber]

This is... not without precedent: https://www.theguardian.com/food/2019/apr/04/eu-to-ban-non-m...

Hopefully these plans will meet a similar end.

[bleep_bloop]

"Veggie discs" gave me a chuckle.

As a vegetarian I don't actually care for meat substitutes anyway, I call them veggie junk food since most of them contain dubious amounts of actual vegetables but I just don't see consumers being confused or hurt by calling veggie burgers, burgers.

Just pointless lobbying in a vein attempt to turn people away from switching from meat.

[celticninja]

this is just dairy industry lobbying, there is no consumer benefit here.

[pgt]

How can you say there is no consumer benefit to having accurate labels?

[bleep_bloop]

Everybody already knows that nut milk is different to cow milk. Calling it nut juice isn't going to to change the contents of the bottle or who would buy it.

What would you predict are the amount of people total who bought almond milk instead of semi-skimmed?

[TeMPOraL]

> What would you predict are the amount of people total who bought almond milk instead of semi-skimmed?

Likely a large amount of people about to or becoming obsessed with fitness, or vegan recipes. The problem here is that all those "milk alternatives" have absolutely nothing to do with milk whatsoever, they have different handling and nutritional value (or lack of it; to the detriment of innocent kids suffering their parents' obsession). For most people, using the word "milk" will pull all kinds of wrong associations from their minds' latent spaces, which they won't be able to evaluate and ignore.

[bleep_bloop]

While I understand your point that nut milk chemically isn't at all related to animal milk, I don't think that's the association that comes to mind when using a product. The association is in it's use. By calling nut or oat milk, 'milk', you're making it clear to the consumer what it should be / can be used for, which is a substitute for animal milk.

By removing the word milk, all you have achieved is confusing the consumer as to what it can be used for. Can I put it on cereal, is it safe to cook with, can it go in coffee, etc, etc.

There isn't a consumer alive who thinks almond milk came from an animal. This is obviously nothing more than industry lobbying gone wild.

[TeMPOraL]

But that's my point. Those plant-based "milks" are not milk substitutes, except in few circumstances you mention. They won't work the same when used in cooking or baking. They don't have the same nutritional value, meaning that if you use them in place of real milks in a cereal for your kid, you may be starving them on nutrients without realizing it. Etc.

For use in coffee? It's already established you can put all kinds of whiteners in it, so no need to brand another one as "milk".

[pydry]

It does appear that theyre completely out of ideas and just milking (am I allowed to use that word, lobbyists?) their power to collect favors.

Starmer is a complete dead end though. Ever since he took over he's thoroughly destroyed the viability of the Labour party - possibly forever. The recent elections confirmed that.

So the Tories will probably still win, even though the majority will split themselves between a protest Lib dem vote, protest SNP vote or protest Labour vote.

[bleep_bloop]

I'm not completely ready to rule out a Labour win next election but Starmer just isn't inspiring. And he's endlessly damaging his own reputation by cancelling a new pledge every week. How can anyone believe a word he says anymore. Hell, he's been given a free pass by the media for the most part and he's still messing it up.

[RobotToaster]

I can somewhat see the logic that it's easy for a product to have MILK in a large font then "not" in tiny font or similar.

[elliekelly]

What would be the motivation for a company to do this though? Trickery is not the way to win over new customers. The people buying these products want “not” milk. They’re specifically seeking out a product that isn’t milk. These companies have every reason to highlight the “not” rather than to hide it.

[reocha]

Traffic proposals?

[bleep_bloop]

Switching off red traffic lights in London at quiet times - https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/politics/22436995/daniel-korsk...

Banning under 25's from carrying passengers under 25 and banned from driving at night - https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/cars/article-8588663/You...

[bleep_bloop]

I don't disagree a staged license for first time drivers might not be a bad idea but the restrictions are too severe and i don't think age should play any factor, it's everyone or no one.

And if they're going to introduce restrictions of young drivers then at the same time there should be an introduction of mandatory retests at 50-60 years of age to prove road worthiness and update road knowledge.

[reocha]

Absolutely, these restrictions are insane. I'm pretty "anti-car" but throwing random restrictions on under 25 year olds doesn't seem like a good solution to the problem.

The red traffic light proposal is absolutely insane.

Also thanks for posting the articles.

[bleep_bloop]

No problem. I thought I was reading an onion article about the traffic lights.

Truly seems like they desperately don't want to enact any social or 'left' policies so they're willing to go balls to the walls with anything else they can think of.