Peers demand PM lobbies President over haggis ban

Patriotic peers have demanded that David Cameron raise the US haggis import ban with President Obama at the White House today. As Steerpike noted yesterday, the 1971 ban on the product is under renewed scrutiny in the run up to Burn’s Night, with Lord McColl demanding answers to great cheers in the House of Lords this morning. Apparently ‘this wholesome food is much better than the junk many Americans eat’.

Tory peer Michael Forsyth even went as far as to demand that a special envoy on the matter be appointed immediately, and suggested the former First Minister Alex Salmond might be free to take the fight directly to the Yanks. Only Labour’s Lord Winston had to be a party-pooper and declare he couldn’t stand the stuff, arguing that should be more worried about what the population of Glasgow are eating rather than the Americans.

Lord Purvis of Tweed, a Liberal Democrat, raised the game by pressing for an urgent message to be sent to the Prime Minister to ask him to raise this issue with the President at their meeting later this afternoon.