Way to go Smokey! The tomb had better have a sprung dance floor because we ex miners have dodgy knees at the best of times....

Don, I love your mental leap that defending an arbitrary benefit for children makes me a fan of Gordon brown. By that logic it would make me a fan of every Prime Minister since Lloyd George set about laying the foundations for the eventual welfare state.

Milk for children was not a waste of money, but the cost of giving milk to those children who didn't need the extra benefit was far outweighed by the benefits of catching those who did need it. A bit like inoculations, 90% of children would not get a disease if they weren't inoculated but it takes a Thatcherian mind to go from that to stopping inoculations on a statistical decision.

In fact, thinking about it, I reckon there is almost as much of a case now as then for milk, with latch key kids surviving on crisps and micro chips....

Oh, and unchristian attitude?   Could start a whole new thread there. What has being or not being a christian got to do with anything? Such a comment is a bit of a slap in the face for Muslims, Hindu, rational people etc. I am not a Christian, but that does not alter a single aspect of the validity (or otherwise!) of my comments.

Calling people unchristian as an insult really gets the heart of many of the issues here. Being a christian denotes tradition and varying degrees of adherence to the teachings of the tradition. It does not make anybody a better person. Smiling and clapping your hands too often may give you a feel good factor, but try doing it at my door whilst my toast is getting cold and see how far you get......