I saw this on television yesterday but couldn’t find anything about it online — although the video is here. Now Robert Sharp has directed me to a couple of pages on this issue.

It seems as though the regulations surrounding advertising junk food are about to be tightened further. Yesterday adverts for junk food were banned during programmes aimed at 16-year-olds and under.

But Netmums reckon this isn’t enough — they want such adverts to be banned until after 9pm! That’s right. Tomato ketchup is on an equal footing with blood and guts. Baps with burgers in them are now as offensive as bare baps.

An incredible fact appears in the Telegraph article as well. If breast milk were to be advertised, it would also be classed as junk food. These new regulations are not intended to do any real good at all. They are just designed to placate the authoritarian parents who think the answer to the world’s ills is more government legislation.

This ban will be completely counter-productive. It is against the interests of children. It is estimated that children’s channels could lose as much as 15% of their revenue as a result. Children’s programming has already seen an appreciable decline in quality. Terrestrial channels have begun to shunt off their children’s programming to various graveyard slots like 5am, to begrudgingly meet the quota.

The new advertising restrictions will accelerate this trend. It wouldn’t surprise me to see some children’s channels begin to go out of business. No doubt Netmums would then be complaining about the lack of decent children’s programming, but it would be partly their fault.

I don’t doubt that junk food is a problem. But is it caused by advertising? Surely only tangentially.

I have always been sceptical about the power of advertising. I spent a huge chunk of my childhood obsessively watching Formula 1 and I never became a smoker or a problem drinker. I’m sure advertising works — otherwise firms wouldn’t do it. But surely it is more about brand recognition than forming habits.

The real cause of the junk food problem is right under parents’ noses — but they can’t bear to accept it. If parents are worried about junk food, there is a simple solution that they can all apply. Don’t feed your children junk food.

It shouldn’t be difficult. If you are too weak-willed say “no” to your child’s requests for junk food, you are not doing your job as a parent.

The Netmums campaign is symptomatic of a wider problem with society. There is not a hint of Netmums suggesting that parents take personal responsibility for the upbringing of their children. Instead, they lobby the government to ensure that their preferred solutions are imposed on everyone — regardless of anyone else’s views on the matter.

The approach is summed up by a quote on the Netmums website.

The amount of ‘junk’ food advertising aimed specifically at children (especially during children’s programmes) is of particular concern to me. This advertising does work (with brand recognition), as my children ask me to buy the foods they have seen advertised.

Oh, and I take it you said no to your children? If not, then take some responsibility and do your job as a parent. If so, then congratulations! You have solved the problem yourself — without having to resort to yet more needless and counter-productive government legislation.

I would like to see a total ban on highly processed foods being promoted to young children (in shops and in the media) and instead see healthy foods advertised (fruit, vegetables, wholemeal bread etc.) using the same type of well-known characters, catchy jingles etc.

So not only does this person want to force junk food manufacturers to stop promoting their products (even in shops!), she also wants to force healthy food companies to advertise!

Nice try getting that to work, but some economic realities are working against you there. If fruit companies found it beneficial to advertise with catchy jingles, they would be doing it already. Perhaps if it is such a great — and financially viable — idea, then Netmums could buy the slots and advertise healthy foods themselves.

The reality? The junk food ban means that children’s television channels are now courting car manufacturers to fill the rather hefty gap (ahem) left by the junk food companies.

As Robert Sharp suggests though, developments in the future (and even in the present) will be even more sinister. Companies will start to resort to more subliminal (and therefore harder to police) forms of advertising such as product placement. And junk food manufacturers are now diverting their substantial advertising budgets (which won’t disappear just because Netmums would like them to) to the increasingly popular children’s websites.

Unlike some people, I am not a fat bastard. But for me, a day is not complete without a packet of crisps. Or two. Or three.

At work a few months ago I was talking to the representative from Walkers Crisps. He told me that Cheddar Cheese flavour was being discontinued along with Spicy Chilli (which most people thought was too hot) and Lamb and Mint (which was never going to be popular beyond novelty value, but I personally enjoyed it).

This made way for the return of Worcester Sauce and the introduction of Cajun Spice. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the Cajun flavour has bombed as badly as the three discontinued flavours.

I was most upset by the fact that Cheddar Cheese was being discontinued. When they were first introduced I recognised the flavour immediately from one of Walkers’s special limited edition rangers. It was the same as Feta Cheese from the Mediterranean flavours. I absolutely loved it!

Seemingly, other people did not. However, while single packs of Cheddar Cheese have been bumped off, they are seemingly still being solid in multipacks. So I can still get my cheesy crispy fix.

Apart from the taste — which would be enough really — the Cheddar Cheese flavour has another thing going for it. Despite being flavoursome, it does not make my breath honk (as far as I know!).

This is unlike certain other flavours such as Cheese and Onion or — even worse — Pickled Onion. I mean, Cheese and Onion crisps are tasty enough, and they are not particularly offensive if I come into close quarters with someone else.

But if I were to get peckish late at night and find myself in need of a midnight snack, Cheese and Onion is a no-go area. Of course I brush my teeth before I go to bed, but the powerful odour of Cheese and Onion is such that the offensive fumes travel back up my digestive system the wrong way and leave me with the most foul taste in my mouth when I wake up.

Cheddar Cheese is not bland like Ready Salted (not that I would say no to a pack of Ready Salted, which is one of my favourite flavours). But its tastiness does not give me a yukky mouth that tastes like its been full of beach sand that the dog pissed in.

Speaking of which, I have also discovered at my work that Pickled Onion is one of the biggest sellers, if not the biggest seller. Why? Has this country got a vampire problem that nobody has told me about?

There are some adverts running at the moment that jar with me a bit. The charity World Vision is advertising for sponsors. Nothing wrong with that of course. And the adverts are hardly going to be works of creative genius either. It’s pretty much what you would expect from that sort of advert.

But there is one thing that really annoys me about them. They go out of their way to point out that the advert is aimed at Scotland. The image to the right is from an advert I saw in MSN Messenger (they know where I live!). If I recall correctly, the television ad says something like, “Come on Scotland!”

I’m not sure what to make of it. There is nothing else particularly Scottish about the adverts. The actor is English, and I recall an older advert featuring John Craven. I am guessing that similar campaigns are running all over the UK, either with no reference at all to Scotland, or with a reference to your particular region. “It’s your call Anglia!”

My guess is that England does not get its own name check, either for England or regions of England. I know there are a few bloggers who get annoyed about Scotland getting fancy labels on its food in supermarkets while England has to make do with being British. English in British out, they call it.

But I don’t really understand the need to mention Scotland in the adverts. Does it actually make Scots delve deeper in their pockets this line is included in their adverts? It must do, otherwise it would be hard to justify the extra cost and effort involved in making different versions of adverts for different parts of the country.

I have spent most of the day saying, “I told you so!” to my mother. I cannot bloody stand Morrisons. While I’m aware that the cause of the latest chapter of E. Coli O157 Scottish edition has not yet been confirmed as Morrisons, it is not looking too good for them.

I had never heard of Morrisons until they took over Safeway. And Safeway was bad enough. I mean, as far as I could tell, the only reason you would shop at Safeway was if the other nearest supermarket was Lidl. Even then, at least Lidl don’t pretend to be classy when they’re not. It’s a bit like, “Look at us being a cheapo food shop where all the cooking instructions are not in English. Take it or leave it.”

Then along comes Morrisons, and boy, that really put Safeway into perspective. Invariably, their own-brand food tastes foul. You might say, “Serves you right for buying own brand food.” But I can eat own brand Sainsbury’s, own brand Tesco, and even own brand bloody Asda without being condemned to a yucky mouth (if you are lucky), violent diarrhoea attacks (if you moderately lucky) or death (if you are unlucky).

Even Kwik Save’s “No Frills” products were more appealing than Morrisons own brand. And I am not talking Morrisons economy or value lines. Actual own brand, I am talking about. Rancid. I have always told this to my parents, who sadly persist on going to Morrisons even though the food is foul.

I think I first noticed when I ate a pork pie. I mean, how you can eat a pork pie that is so dodgy that you can taste its dodginess is beyond me. Surely the point of pork pies is that they are disgustingly, disgracefully unhealthy. I doubt the existence of premium free range organic pork pies (although if you know of any, point me in the direction). Yet this pork pie was drier than the Sahara desert, which is just plain wrong. Actually, I think a mouthful of sand from the Sahara desert may have been preferable.

Then there are the rolls. Most supermarkets say something along the lines of, “Freshly baked today.” The label on this packet of “crusty rolls” says “Prepared for you in this store”. That is about as ominous as it gets. These rolls are less “crusty” and more “rock solid”. It tastes as though they have been “prepared for me in this store” then left out in the blazing sun to go stale for five days before someone remembered to put it out on the shelf.

One of my mother’s suggestions was that maybe it is not Morrisons’ fault, but a problem with their suppliers. But that hardly vindicates Morrisons. It just suggests that they are too cheap and / or rubbish to hook up with a supplier that can make pork pies with some moisture in.

If the source of this E. coli outbreak turns out to be Morrisons, then it will suggest that they were dealing with a meat supplier that was unable to follow the most basic of hygiene instructions. You know, like washing your hands between handling uncooked and cooked meat. Stuff that children know.

And of course I have an opinion on their logo, which is surely one of the worst known to man. Yellow and black can be a nice combination, but what is with that disgustingly ugly font? It looks like it was designed in the 1980s. The new logo is not much of an improvement. It looks like it was designed using Microsoft Word’s draw tools.

You might think I am joking, but this is a big part of what makes Morrisons unappealing to me. I mean, when the shop’s signage and products’ packaging are so ugly, it hardly gives you confidence about the quality of what’s inside. In short, Morrison’s image is old-fashioned and fusty. The food I had tasted old and fusty.

I am not all that picky when it comes to foods. Sure, I’m a bit queasy about sell by dates and the like, but I don’t mind eating cheap food. But I began to notice a pattern and it actually got to the point where I refused to eat own brand Morrisons products. This is not a joke. It is not every day you have your lifestyle choices vindicated by the top story in the news.

(NB. I do not wish to imply that I could have caught E. coli or any other gastric disease from Morrisons own brand pork pies or crusty rolls. Just that I found them so totally disgusting that I refused to eat them ever again.)

Perhaps my geekiest guilty pleasure is an interest in television idents. Many a lonely Friday evening has been spent perusing such websites as TV Ark and The TV Room. Not because I’m a sad loner, you understand, but because it’s the really cool thing to do these days.

I also love cereals. The most functional cereal of them all is Weetabix. It’s the only way to go if you have a particularly challenging day ahead. There is nothing in the world that three Weetabix can’t solve. Except perhaps indigestion.

So an advertising campaign that combines the might of Weetabix with the quaint kitsch of classic television idents cannot be anything but awesome. I don’t watch much television these days, so I guess there is the chance that everyone in the world apart from me already knew about it and this post is a bit like going, “ALL BECAUSE THE LADY LOVES MILK TRAY! LOL!”

The only way I learned about the Weetabix advertising campaign was from a post at Idents.tv. I had seen one of the adverts before out of the corner of my eye, probably when I was fast forwarding through the adverts during a grand prix. It didn’t occur to me that it was supposed to mimic idents, with their trippy ambient music and strange abstract visuals.

The TV theme is continued at the Weetabix.tv website, where all of the ident-adverts are available to view. A lot of them have clearly been inspired by classic BBC Two idents from the 1990s.

We have all seen idents thousands of times. Yet, they are forgotten by many and treated as though they are merely wallpaper at best and an annoyance at worst. Yet, idents are the most familiar sight on television; a reminder that all is right in the world. They are beautiful pieces of design that are almost always better than the programme that follows them. So it’s great to see idents being recognised by Weetabix in their advertising campaign.