Why I won’t buy from Gail’s Bakery

I am not one of those people who go around boycotting anything and everything. Forcing institutions to forgo sponsorship money because the perfectly legal company that wants to give them wheelbarrows of cash has some business interests in Israel or invests in oil firms or arms companies is not for me.

Not least this is because I doubt if any of the intended firms give a damn about such virtue signalling. Also, I drive a car, and I am a supporter of stronger British armed forces – so a personal boycott on those grounds would be hypocritical.

But I will buy nothing from Dyson or Gail’s.

My wife is hinting very heavily that a silent fan might be useful at this time of year, but I have told her that she will have to find one that isn’t made by the Brexit-supporting, Singapore based, Dyson. And when it comes to bread and other baked goods, I will not have Gail’s in the house, which is a pity because it is rather good bread.

It is just that I draw the line at business leaders who supported Brexit, it is perhaps just as well that I will never need to buy a JCB, although, as they say, “other backhoe loaders are available”. And it is nice to know that I am not alone.

As you might have seen, there is a campaign to stop Gail’s from opening a new store in Walthamstow. This was rooted in the desire of many locals to keep such chains off their high street and support local stores instead, but it has now picked up support from Remainers.

That is because Luke Johnson, the serial entrepreneur who is chairman and part-owner of Gail’s, was a big fan of leaving the EU. He was a Covid lockdown cynic too.

I don’t buy anything Johnson is involved with, for a personal reason. It is that when I was working for the BBC during the Brexit campaign and the vast majority of British industry was in favour of staying in the EU, it used to infuriate me that in the interests of “balance” I had to put as many companies in favour of leaving as of staying in my reports.

Even now, when the vast majority of British industry still wants few things more from the current government than closer ties with the EU, people like Johnson and James Dyson have not changed their minds and still talk as if they represent “British industry.” Well, they don’t.

It is totally within their rights to say what they want, and I would always defend that right. Also, I want no part of those who attack Luke Johnson because they apparently don’t like his criticism of Hamas. I am not getting on a bandwagon with them.

But I have the right to do and say what I want too. And my personal choice is to not buy from Gail’s while Johnson is involved.

The damage that Brexit has done to our country sticks in my craw – and so would Gail’s bread.