Road - Drinking and driving

Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles recently commissioned a survey of 1,000 van drivers which suggests that the van driver's hot drink of choice these days is no longer tea!

In fact, tea is ranked third behind coffee, with Cappuccino as the top choice and Latte second. Even worse is the 'fact' that almost one in five opt for an alternative milk, such as oat, almond, soy or coconut. And when they do favour regular milk, they prefer semi-skimmed to full fat.

A further look down the top nine (see list below) prompts deep suspicion of this survey's findings. A couple of questions arise instantly. Was the survey conducted purely amongst VW LCV drivers? And where was the survey conducted - London, the Home Counties, England?

Methinks a Scottish survey across all makes of van drivers might reveal rather different outcomes. Transit drivers were most obviously not consulted.

For instance, you simply can't drink coffee with a proper Scottish morning roll and square sausage with tattie scone. Nope, pure nonsense, and perhaps should be made illegal. Such proper nutrition requires tea as the appropriate accompaniment. It's the same with the full Scottish breakfast roll - sq sausage, tattie scone, bacon, black pudding and an egg. That needs serious tea to wash it down and set folk up for the day.

And another thing, where was the survey conducted? Cafe and bistro takeaways, or did they check out any of the caravans in lay-bys around the country?

We all have our favourite quick snack stop-overs. For instance, the caravan at Peggy White's corner on the old A8 at Newhouse where a double sq sausage on a roll with a cup of black tea is hard to beat. It has to be a double sausage too, because it's so succulent, savoury and meaty. Add a dash of brown sauce and it just completes the whole mouth watering, satisfying delight. Ye cannae beat it. The sausage itself is also made locally by Mallagh the Butcher's in Chapelhall - and the butcher himself lives just two doors up from  me!

In other words, heaven is three inches square, slightly crisp at the edges, with a tasty, meaty, brown sauce topped middle, wrapped up in an oven fired, golden and crispy topped mound of fluffy dough.

And then there is the question of Scotch mutton pies. It would be sacrilegious to drink anything other than a cup of tea with a pie or pie sandwich. It might be possible to stretch as far as a bottle of Irn Bru, but nope, tea is for pies, coffee is for croissants and other French stuff.

And the reason I mention this 'statistical survey' at all? In case you hadn't noticed, there is a general election upon us and over the next few weeks we are going to get a whole variety of folk with different political persuasions using exactly the same damn statistics to support opposing points of view. So if we can't trust a 'tea survey' what bluidy chance have we got?

Van driver’s (VW?) top hot drinks

1. Cappuccino: 18%
2. Latte: 16%
3. English breakfast tea: 13%
4. Hot chocolate: 12%
5. Americano: 11%
6. Flat white: 10%
7. Espresso: 9%
8. Mocha: 5%
9. Other tea: 2%