The Treasury has been slammed over its half-baked proposal to stop civil servants from bringing cake into the office. Guido’s story that the civil service ‘Wellbeing Workstream’ sees “cake office culture” as a “public health hazard” has got a rise out of John O’Connell, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance. He warns:

“This is little more than a bittersweet waste of taxpayer-funded time and resources. Taxpayers would want to know what exactly the role of the Treasury’s ‘Wellbeing Workstream’ is and how much taxpayer-funded resources are poured into this nannying of fellow civil servants. It might come as a shock to Whitehall penpushers but people are perfectly capable of deciding for themselves what sort of snacks to bring into work without the meddling of a colleague with some fancy title.”

Number 10 have weighed in, insisting they are “pro-cake”. We know the Foreign Secretary’s view…

UPDATE: Ban panned by minister:

@UKCivilService sorry but I will continue to bake occasionally for my Private Office Team. Everything in moderation 😉

— Robert Buckland MP (@RobertBuckland) January 30, 2017