They say that Northern Ireland can be a small-minded, insular place. A locale referred to by some as ‘our wee country’, where a fixation with petty local bigotries blinds people to larger global concerns. Fortunately Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) MP for North Antrim Jim Allister has set his lofty sights on changing all that.
In an era of mass rearmament portending global military conflagration, in an age of climate breakdown, in a period of international law being ground into the dust — our hero has a vision for setting things right. And it starts with…labels on a tray bake in his local bread shop.
Allister used suitably apocalyptic language to address this seismic threat appearing before him in miniature cake form.
The tightening of the EU noose is manifesting itself every day, even to the point where tray bakes are in the firing line.
Noose! Firing line! What lethal threat could have prompted language brimming with such violent metaphors?!
The unionist will not surrender to tray bake tyranny
Our man donned his flak jacket and dispensed this missive from the trenches (the ones beside the chocolate eclairs, just to the left of the jam doughnuts):
I have a local bakery in my constituency which has been required to relabel its tray bakes to list allergens which are not required to be cited by U.K. law, but are by EU law.
The irony here is that the TUV man is highlighting an actual threat here. Unfortunately, he’s got the wrong end of the (French) stick, as the danger is in fact posed by not having proper allergy labels. According to Allergy UK:
Around 10 people each year die in England and Wales as a result of having a food allergy.
Perhaps a few more corpses would be a sacrifice worth paying to escape EU labelling tyranny. Maybe local martyrs could receive their own mural: “They died for God, Ulster and less verbose tray bake packaging.”
It’s a fairly moot point, as anyone familiar with Irish tray bakes will know. You take your life in your hands already when scoffing the salt, sugar and fat-laden local delicacy. Forget a traffic light system of labelling, a network of hazard warning beacons would be a more appropriate setup at the bakery counter when these are present.
Allister’s gripe is part of a longstanding grievance among unionists regarding post-EU arrangements for Northern Ireland. Currently the region is still subject to EU law. The Windsor Framework is intended to ensure that swift trade with Britain can take place, along with maintaining an open border with the rest of Ireland.
To get round the ‘democratic deficit’ of being subject to laws that people in the Six Counties have no say in, MLAs can ask the British government to veto new or amended EU laws in a “last resort” under “the most exceptional circumstances.”
Labels are colonisers, but land theft project ‘Israel’ is dead on
Whether enforcing a few extra words on the packaging of a sugary snack fits those criteria is unlikely. However, local politicians would rather waste their time squabbling over any ridiculous shite than doing any actual useful work, so expect “words written on bread” to be the major item on Stormont’s agenda for 2026.
Big Jim says he has “of course…complained to the local Environmental Health department”. Because fucking obviously, what better way would there to be to spend your time as a legislator in a place with some of the worst waiting lists around, and a violent, resurgent far-right?
He proceeds to rage against the “effrontery” of being:
…subject, colony like, to foreign EU jurisdiction.
Just as with his meandering around allergies, he gets dangerously close to the truth here. Sadly, he’s misidentified the colonisers, which in this case are Britain and the United States. He’s had 800 years to spot the first one, and as for the latter, he ought to be more concerned with the ‘food’ they’re sending our way. In fact, the TUV wouldn’t recognise a colony even if they were bought off and flown to one.
Bakeries appear to be second only to flegs when it comes to making a certain kind of bigot flip their lid. A recent bake sale in East Belfast was pogrommed out of the loyalist bastion for having the temerity to help Palestinians survive a holocaust. Previous to that, the infamous Gay Cake saga preoccupied tiny minds for what felt like an ice age.
We’ll leave it with Harry Enfield, who perhaps captured the region’s capacity for foodstuff-induced rage more accurately than anyone thus far.
Featured image via the Canary
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