I'm sure you all have, at some point, been on the receiving end of a government department's letters, if only when they were telling you that they had lost yours and 17 million other peoples' personal data, which had been stored on a disc and sent in the post, or by courier, to a new destination 6 months ago but which they have only just dicscovered did not arrive.
I don't know if it is just me but I do find the tone of these letters invariably patronising.

" We need to make sure that we continue to pay you the right amount of Child Benefit.

Please read the notes we have sent with this form. They tell you what changes you must tell us about and will help you to complete pages 3 and 4 of this form.
You can tell us about changes by phone or in writing. Our phone number and address are shown at the top of this form. The phone number is the one with numbers and no letters, the address is mostly letters. If we thought you could tell your left from your right we would have included that helpful information too.
Oh, hang on, we also have two(2) other lines of letters and numbers. Oh dear, perhaps you had better take this form along to the post office where one of the helpful people behind the counter will be able to patronise you in person and then charge you a considerable fee for the privilege. Yes that was a big word but we didn't want you to understand what we were saying there. O.K., off you pop now, look here's little Johnny, he needs his nose wiping."

Indeed this attitude seems to be rather endemic at the moment, what with new government campaigns to make us aware of how much alcohol we consume.... (I haven't got a drink problem, I drink, get drunk, fall over, throw up... no problem!)
how to get a balanced diet... eat on a see saw
how much exercise to get.... carrying the tinnies back to the house is aerobic exercise as is seeing how fast and how far you can throw last week's apples
what rubbish we can put in which bin and even how much rubbish we can put in each bin.. why do boys always leave the lid up?
how to save energy.... forget about the above exercise regime and order your shopping on line, if you leave the apples long enough they will eventually disappear.

However, the fight back begins! The GMC have announced new guidelines for doctors which state that doctors should avoid patronising their patients and should discuss conditions, treatments and side effects and respect patients decisions, including a patients decision not to have any treatment. ( Yes doctor I do know that drinking twenty units of alcohol a day is bad for me, but whose liver is it anyway?)

Today the doctors sugery, tomorrow the world, well hopefully HM Revenue and Customs, Department of Health, Department for Work, Benefits and Pensions or whatever it is called now and all the rest.