Who wants to be weighed in the workplace?

It has often been said that, just as Prussia was an army with its own state, Britain is now a healthcare system with its own country. Keir Starmer’s Labour government is certainly driving that point home. It has announced this week that the NHS is to begin a new absurdly named ‘Health MoT’ service starting next month. That’s right, the British state is set to treat older members of the public like cars, and check whether they’re still ‘roadworthy’.

Under the scheme, NHS staff will turn up at any place of work enrolled in the scheme at some point in the next six months. They will then proceed to weigh any employees over the age of 40, check their blood pressure and measure their cholesterol. A failed Health MoT could then lead to said employees being offered blood-pressure medication, statins to reduce cholesterol or even a referral to a weight-loss clinic. Although it should be said that the Health MoTs are not mandatory. Not yet, at least.

Apparently, these impromptu health assessments will be aimed primarily at male-dominated industries, like pubs, factories and building sites. The aim is supposedly to catch preventable diseases early, like type-2 diabetes, heart disease and certain cancers, which are more common in men beyond middle age. Presumably, women can be trusted to take themselves to the doctor, rather than have to be weighed in the supply cupboard while their colleagues wait outside.

It’s a very odd scheme to foist on the public. If you’re over 40, you can already opt to undergo a voluntary health check at your local GP surgery. So quite why the government has decided to harass and embarrass people at work is unclear. Perhaps it’s because only 40 per cent of those eligible for the over-40s health check take up the option. But that may have something to do with the fact that trying to actually get a face-to-face doctor’s appointment is now a Sisyphean task for most people.

There’s a weirdly dystopian feel to the whole scheme. Andrew Gwynne, minister for public health and prevention, called the Health MoT ‘an important step towards community-focussed healthcare and supporting economic productivity through improving health… easing the strain on the NHS and helping people to live well for longer’. Think of it as Nineteen Eighty-Four meets Weight Watchers.

It is remarkable that Gywnne managed to get so far through his spiel before mentioning ‘easing the strain on the NHS’. When ministers talk of ‘preventative’ healthcare, it almost always means more meddling in our personal lives to keep prospective patients away from hospitals and GP surgeries. To Starmer and the rest, people’s lives and liberties are always to be sacrificed to the needs of that great, greedy deity: Our NHS.

We saw this mad devotion to the NHS in action again this week in the shape of Starmer’s stunningly joyless plan to ban smoking in places like pub gardens and outside nightclubs. Despite jabbering on about public health and preventable deaths, Starmer soon revealed the real reason for the ban – to ‘relieve the burden’ on the health service.

So much for ‘treading lightly on people’s lives’, as Starmer promised to do mere months ago. A ban on smoking outside. NHS staff carrying out on-the-spot health checks at work. By the looks of things, it won’t be long before we have government-mandated lunchbox marshalls checking that you’re not taking one too many Jaffa Cakes from the break-room biscuit tin.

Here’s a novel idea. How about the state leave us alone?

Lauren Smith is a staff writer at spiked.