Excess baggage.

The “fat tax” was a government plan concocted in the early 90’s to increase the price of tasty treats and naughty nibbles by 17.5 per cent. The idea was to try to curb the nation’s cravings for all things calorific. However, this week the term has developed far more personal, humiliating and potentially degrading implications.

The controversial concept of a “pay as you weigh” proposal for super-sized Brits at airport check-ins across the country may have slim-line specimens jumping up and down with glee. But the notion itself is clearly fraught with stereotypical and insulting complications. It could also cause huge amounts of emotional stress to those the other side of svelt, as health groups have sensitively pointed out.

How exactly is this going to work, I wonder? Will there be yet another ridiculously long, yet absurdly regimented queue in the departures lounge where sheepish-looking travellers wait their turn to jump on the scales? That would look like some sort of mortifying cattle market.

Nevertheless I must admit, I have always felt rather indignant as I stand at the check-in in any European airport, laden like a South-American pack-horse with books and shoes for which I get charged extortionate amounts, whilst a fleshy flyer in front manages to get away without paying any extra.

Charging corpulent customers a weight-based surcharge also makes commercial sense, as heavier loads increase fuel costs. Smokers are taxed. So are drinkers. And gamblers too. A “fat tax” might not only encourage people to lose weight, but deter others from putting it on and stop the obesity pandemic which is crippling our nation.

On the plane itself, especially on budget airlines where there isn’t even enough space to open a broadsheet without causing utter pandemonium, weight issues also cause irritation and frustration. A long-limbed lad or a leggy young lass has to pay more for extra leg room, but large people who encroach on your personal space are not. One could argue that people don’t choose to be tall, but some can choose whether or not to be overweight.

What is more, it emerged in The Telegraph last week that a couple wishing to emigrate to New Zealand had to split up because Rowan Trezise, the wife, had not managed to lose enough weight to be allowed in to the country. The reason? She would be a heavy burden on the country’s health care system. Her husband has gone ahead without her.

Although rather harsh, I understand the reasoning behind these apparently callous rules. I don’t think that there is a person out there who is not fully aware of the fact that last year, obesity cost the National Health Service – drumroll… - a whopping £4billion.

But apart from the fact that this system should take in to account more than simply Body Mass Index in order to assess candidates health problems, I worry that for all its good intentions, this particular process of selection could simply open the dangerous flood-gate for an avalanche of similarly ruthless criterion. First, fatties. Next, smokers. Then binge drinkers. Where will it end?

Yet whether we care to admit it or not, obesity is a killer. And perhaps a hard-nosed, merciless approach to its elimination would be far more successful than the current atmosphere of the “nanny state” which is all talk and no action.