Bunhill: Leigh delivers broadside to successors

EDWARD LEIGH, the former consumer affairs minister, has delivered a robust broadside to his successors at the Department of Trade and Industry. In the latest issue of What's Brewing, the newspaper of the Campaign for Real Ale, he accuses the Government of doing a U-turn on its promise to introduce full-pint legislation.

The real ale fanatics are fed up with landlords fobbing them off with nine-tenths of a pint and a half-inch of froth. But the long-promised amendment to the Weights & Measures Act (section 43) to force them to give full pints was scrapped late last year. 'It was all agreed, and now the Government has caved into brewing interests,' says Leigh bitterly (groan). 'Once more a Conservative government has caved in to the brewers.'

The DTI, under Michael Heseltine, says the climbdown was part of the programme to slash red tape. 'If you're unhappy with the measure you get, request a top-up. If the landlord refuses, you have the right to go to your trading standards officer.'

Camra remains unimpressed. I suggest they exact their revenge by coining a new word - 'the Heseltine' - to describe a less-than-brimming pint.

(Photograph omitted)