If I were king for a day, I would ban Coca-Cola. / Guardian.

If I were king for a day, I would ban Coca-Cola

This sugary drink neither quenches thirst nor increases energy. It damages teeth, thickens waistlines and lightens purses

Alan Johnson

The Guardian, Friday 26 September 2014 / http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/26/king-for-day-ban-coca-cola-alan-johnson

The absolute power to do anything, but for one day only. Not enough time to eradicate poverty, find a cure for cancer or ensure parity of esteem between academic and vocational education. I could turn QPR into Premier League champions, but it’s important not to stray into fantasy.

One thing: a single proclamation; a dictat that required no pandering to public opinion or consultation with a focus group. It’s simple. I’d ban Coca-Cola and all its offshoots, lookalikes and variants.

I considered restricting my banning order to consumption by the under-25s. Sloshing this sugary chemical into the throats of children has no beneficial effect whatsoever. If fluoride gives poor kids rich kids’ teeth, cola can do the opposite. It neither quenches thirst nor increases energy. It’s responsible for damaged teeth, thicker waistlines and lighter purses.

Its eradication would have a positive effect on educational attainment and improve behaviour in the classroom. Ideally, the ban would be accompanied by the introduction of free healthy meals in every primary school. (I note that this is now Lib Dem policy. It was introduced in Hull 10 years ago and then scrapped by an incoming Lib Dem administration.)

But why restrict these benefits to children? My power allows me to save adults from themselves; to push them towards healthier beverages such as rooibos tea and mango juice – or good old Adam’s Ale, that marvellous, refreshing drink that’s free at the tap (and expensive at the supermarket). As king of the world I would make this ban international. The global power of a huge corporation would be removed at a stroke.

When I was at secondary school, our geography teacher, Mr Woosnam, would show reel-to-reel cine films from exotic and remote parts of the world. They often had a car rally involving a driver named Paddy Hopkirk. The film would flicker from a huge projector on to a shaky white screen or the classroom wall. One image was common to them all – the Coca-Cola sign hanging off the corner of a ramshackle shop. Whether it was a Peruvian city or a clearing somewhere in Africa, that white lettering on a red background was ubiquitous.

That was in the early 1960s. Goodness knows how its reach has expanded since. Amazonian tribes making contact with the outside world for the first time will probably emerge from the jungle clutching that familiarly shaped bottle. As a symbol of socially useless power it is rivalled only by those investment bank products that Adair Turner drew attention to.

On this one day, my power will exceed theirs. Coca-Cola would disappear, irrespective of its attempts to make itself respectable by producing a “diet” version. A great gushing waterfall would release it into sealable caverns previously reserved for nuclear waste, with a proportion kept back to be used for steam-cleaning heavy machinery. The result will be an army of happy children marching forward together, eyes bright, teeth gleaming; instead of teaching the world to sing, they will teach it to stop consuming sugar. Humanity will be all the sweeter for it.