Ostriches spotted in Manchester

I was struck by this piece from Chimp magazine (?!) who gathered together a panel to discuss the state of the pub trade in Manchester.

The item closest to The Chimp’s heart, though, was the panel on the putative demise of the Great British Boozer. And what a thoughtfully selected panel it was: Oliver Robinson of Robinson’s Brewery, Jan Rogers of Marble Brewery, Cleo Farman of Odd Group and John Quilter, former proprietor of now defunct Marmalade in Manchester 21.

Their discussions contained the astonishing statement that:

The panel also concurred that the smoking ban had had zero effect on their bottom line, and at least two of them enjoy a fag now and then to our knowledge, so no baccy-free evangelism here.

Now, that may be true for handful of metrosexual bars in Chorlton and Central Manchester, but surely these people cannot be blind to the pub devastation in Manchester’s suburbs and satellite towns. And are they saying that every single pub operator who has attributed reduced profits to the smoking ban over the past few years has been lying? Take this, for example, from J. W. Lees earlier this year:

JW Lees, the family-owned brewery based in Middleton, blamed another poor summer and the continuing impact of the smoking ban introduced in 2007 for a 34 per cent drop in profits in the year to March 31, 2009.

And I can’t honestly believe that is Oliver Robinson’s opinion, given the number of his company’s pubs that have closed over the past three years.

The continued denial of reality from some sections of the pub trade, while pubs continue to tumble like ninepins around them, is truly amazing.

A RANT AND AN APOLOGY

I had to take a few minutes out to post up a rant - and an apology - about ecigs.

I always felt threatened by them because I feared that normalising the use of those, and denormalising the use of tobacco, would lead to us all having to become vapers and choice to use the natural plant product would be denied in time.

Then I hear about this and moves to make ecig smoking illegal

Some vapers I know have been saying for ages that this is the way things are going for them. The anti-smoking industry doesn't own any shares in the ecig market. Vapers say that smokers who choose to vape, as a way of avoiding tobacco use, are not allowed to quit tobacco smoking unless they buy Big Pharma cessation products.

The apology comes from my previous bigotted comments about vapers based on the assumption that ecigs were something they are not.

Yes, I guess we're all in it together brothers and sisters.

HT - Dave Atherton

Tilting the scales

Phil Mellows points out here two aspects of the Coalition’s proposed licensing reforms that have the potential to cause serious problems for the pub trade. It is planned to drop the requirement for objectors to licences to live “in proximity” to the premises in question, and also to add the “promotion of public health” to licensing objectives.

In combination these measures could open the way for alliances of public objectors, ideologically motivated by a general dislike of pubs, drinking and people enjoying themselves. Indeed, the germ of such an organised force already exists, set up by the temperance-funded Institute of Alcohol Studies.

So this gives some miseryguts in Stockton the right to object to a pub licence in Stockport just because it’s a pub and therefore a source of moral degeneracy?

And how on earth is a pub supposed to “promote public health”? While it may create a lot of human happiness, and thus improve people’s state of mind, it can’t really be said that a pub, especially a wet-led one, promotes health in the terms defined by the Righteous. Does any other type of business have such a pious aspiration loaded on to it?

As with many other such things, in the short term this may seem as though it’s nothing much to be worried about, but in the long run it must have the potential to come back and bite pubs with a vengeance. This is not “rebalancing” the licensing laws, but tipping them very steeply against the pub trade. And the more pubs become sanitised temples of health, the more their customers will turn to the arms of Tesco and informal social gatherings on private premises.

THE MADNESS OF WRITERS

I'm well into my script dissertation which I'm hoping to finish by the end of August but it means that I'll have to take another short blog break.

I've not slept or eaten much as I've sat glued to my computer, wrestling with my characters, plots, themes, scenes, actions, pace and settings. Just when I think I'm there and everything is in place, one of them starts whispering in my ear, and keeps me awake, drags me from the table, or out of the bath. At least now I know why writers are nuts.

Thankfully, the madness is almost over. I've got 13 of 90 pages to go, and a stillbirth, a death, a happy and a poignant ending to fit in. Hopefully, then, I'll be about there with just my 6000 report to follow.

Bye for now - I'm off for a sandwich, a cuppa, and a well deserved smoke.

I WANT THAT ONE!

Looks like Andy, from Lou and Andy fame, has been getting about a bit

I'M IN LURVE

Ooh - I do love my worthy blog mascot which I share with fellow blogger Dick Puddlecote.

Because smokers can legally be refused work because they are - erm - smokers, then the whole idea of positive discrimination, fairness for minorities ect is quite simply, in my view, an outdated concept.

NUTTERS!

Is THIS the most insane and unjustified ban in the world?

It's certainly an indication that anti-smokers need a straight jacket and little help from men in white coats to bundle them into the phsyco van for immediate treatment for their obsessive and unnatural behaviour.

The spokesbod gave this reason for it :

"It's not right to have non-smokers exposed to deadly smoke from smokers," said Jabeer al-Jebori, head of the Qadisiyah council. "The resolution will help limit the spread of smoking in the province. Our goal is to have clean air inside government buildings to protect our employees' health."


Any one who agrees with the Iraqui nutter above obviously needs mental health treatment.

A wisp of smoke or a car bomb? Car bomb or wisp of smoke? Only the sane among us know which poses the greater threat. Life expectancy must be so low over there because of the war that I would think smoking should be encouraged as one the smallest pleasures left to an invaded and oppressed people.

ONLY THE IRISH ....

I hear that the NuGovt is to abolish the ASBO.

In Ireland, it appears they have their own way of dealing with anti social behaviour.

I really don't approve of such action but I guess it's more effective than the current ASBO Badge Of Honour handed out in towns and cities across the mainland.

A RANT ABOUT WATER

Sometimes I can be thrown into an utter state of ranting and swearing by the simple act of a letter from a huge organisation that makes me feel completely out of control of my ability to make my own choices.

A few weeks ago, for example, my water supplier Anglian Water, wrote to all households in the area to say they were coming to fit a water meter. Eh? I thought. No-one's asked me about this and one thing I know is that I don't want a water meter, not now, not ever.

You see I have this idea that water meter equals rations and I'll still be charged through the nose for it. I won't change my mind. When we moved a couple of years ago, we looked at various properties and some we discounted because they had water meters. We didn't want one.

Anglian Water said that once the meter was fitted, if we didn't like it we could change our minds. Hmmm. It all sounds very simple but having been a customer of AW for about two decades, one thing I know is that the customer does not come first. If they did, for example, then they wouldn't screw us for payment of water that we haven't even had yet. We have to pay a year in advance OR ELSE!

So, I'm thinking, once AW gets everyone on this meter, and time passes, and I'm the only one who decides I don't want it will they change it back? I'm sincerely doubtful. Choice, over time, will be gone so I'm not even going down the road into eventual forced compliance because I've allowed the means to use that force in my house at this stage.

I phoned the water company to tell them of my views.

"It's my house. I own it. And I don't want your meter," I said. "I'm also responsible for the pipes outside of my property so don't even think of touching them to create your meter network."

The person who took the call feebly indicated that all she could do was make a note on the file and there I left it.

Yesterday, I received yet another letter from AW telling me, along with other residents, that I had to be home on a certain day to meet the contractors who would want access to my property and grounds to do a survey before my meter is installed. That's where the swearing and ranting came into it. Grrrr.

I rang the contractors. No note on file. I explained my position and warned them that should they come within an inch of my grounds or property I'd have 'em, for trespassing and if they touched my pipes, I do 'em for criminal damage.

Again it was explained to me that I had a choice and if I didn't like the meter, I could change back. I told him I didn't care. My mind was already made up. He tried to persuade me that just allowing a little survey to be one wouldn't hurt. I said I didn't want a meter, not now, not ever, so no point. I again warned him that should his people come any where my property, I'd sue.

He said he'd make a note on file.

On re-reading the second letter from AW, I noted the small print which did indeed say that if I didn't like the meter once it was in, I could change back. But - and there's always a "but" - if I move into a house already fitted with one, then I can't have it changed.

So, AW intends to put water meters everywhere, pretend the householder has a choice, and then pull that choice from them once they have normalised meter use.

I'm afraid I can't be persuaded by any nonsense about lack of water in reservoirs either in a country where it rains almost all year except for about a month of scorching weather dotted through summer if we're lucky.

Heading North

I have been having a further look through the North Review which recommends cutting the UK drink-drive limit. It has to be said that the entire report reads as though it is written to back up an already formed conclusion rather than dispassionately assessing the arguments. Once you look behind all the verbiage, there is actually no new research evidence that wasn’t included in the previous consultation document produced thirteen years ago.

While some passing references are made, there is no serious attempt made to analyse types of drink-drivers, whether law-abiding or currently illegal, what their motivations are and how they might respond to a change in the law. There is little point in advocating a change in the law unless you provide some analysis of the likely level of compliance.

There is an assumption that cutting the legal limit will reduce the numbers driving when well over the limit, which is questionable in itself and indeed somewhat unreasonable anyway. This is similar to the oft-heard claim that increasing the average price of alcoholic drinks will reduce the number of “problem drinkers”. Well, it might, but it will hurt responsible drinkers too, and the problem drinkers are probably the least likely to be swayed by price increases. If the aim is to cut the number of over-80mg drivers, then surely the best way of doing it is to devote more resources to testing, rather than penalise those at lower alcohol levels in the vague hope it will also influence those currently breaking the law.

The claimed reductions in fatalities are at the same time dubiously specific, but cover a very broad range. Given some of the holes in the research it's difficult to attach much confidence to them. 43 to 168 is one hell of a range! Could it not easily be 0 to 125? Or -43 to 82? I tend to believe that if this was implemented any reduction in casualties would be so small as to be lost in the noise of wider trends. After all, road fatalities in Great Britain fell by 12% between 2008 and 2009 without any significant changes in traffic legislation.

Mandatory one-year bans at 50mg, as proposed by North, would give us the strictest legal regime of any country in Europe with a 50mg limit. All countries with a 50mg limit either do not impose bans until some way above that level, or only impose short bans for lower level offenders.

The report does not recommend the general adoption of “unfettered discretion” (often incorrectly described as "random testing"), but it does say that it should be allowed in defined circumstances where there was a high risk of offences being committed, such as on the roads surrounding major sporting events. However, the worry with that is that the power could easily be abused to harass specific individuals or establishments, who would have no legal comeback. It also acknowledges that senior police officers have stated that in their view their current powers do not in practice restrict them from carrying out breath testing. The prime restriction on testing is resources, not limited powers.

While it is presented as a road safety measure, there does seem to be an unspoken anti-drink agenda behind all of this. Lowering the limit would force responsible people who hold driving licences to consider their alcohol consumption more carefully, both immediately before driving and on the night before driving, and would also lower the bar as to what, in both circumstances, was considered acceptable. It is likely to prove a far more effective means of closing pubs than of saving lives on the road, just as the smoking ban has been far better at closing pubs than reducing smoking.

There is a very good official response to the report from the Association of British Drivers here – I can’t find much to disagree with in that.

SILLY WEEK

Silly Week? THIS is just bloody stupid!

I hate fish. They're creepy and weird and good for just one thing - eating!

For those not sure what Silly Week is, check out DP's BLOG

FREEZING IN THE WIND

Over at the F2C BLOG someone called Citizen E has re-written the words to a Bob Dylan song and called it A Battle Anthem For Smokers. See comment three.

Join the Resistance!

A BATTLE ANTHEM FOR SMOKERS.

How many ships took those men far away
To fight and suffer death and pain
How many men in both world wars
Never saw the light of day again
How many men were broken and returned
To be treated as heroes every one
The answer my friend is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind

How many years have passed since that time
Are veterans treated just the same
How many stand in the wind and the rain
Still proud but questioning in pain
How many feel that they’ve been betrayed
By a country to which they gave their all
The answer my friend is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind.

How many roads must a man walk down
Before they call him a man
How many times must he prove himself
Like a soldier in Afghanistan
How many times when he comes home
Is he treated like an outcast not a man
The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind.

How many times must the questions be asked
And dogma given in reply
How many heroes in the twilight of their years
Are denied compassion till they die
How many zealots should hang their heads in shame
For a law that is pie in the sky
The answer my friend is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind

How many persecutors of the old and infirm
Whose war cry is de-normalise them all
Have forced upon society a vicious smoking ban
That contains no compromise at all
How have the population of a country once so great
Stood by and never heard the call
The answer my friend is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind

When will the people say undo what you have done
And return the voice of reason to the land
When will the politicians listen to the call
Of society divided by a ban
When will 15 Million smokers rally to the call
And defend the right of dignity for all
The answer “Now my friend” is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind.

SMOKERS FUND? THOUGHTS WELCOME

It's great to see THIS fund has been set up to help alleviate the suffering and stress of pub landlords who have been denied the opportunity to use their own premises as they wish but my own view is is that it doesn't go far enough.

That's why I have toyed with the idea of setting up a PayPal Smoker's fund to bail out all of those smokers who fall foul of bad laws including litter dropping, smoking in a work van, which is used solely by a smoker, for example, or a jobsworth swooping down on an unsuspecting smoker who may have found the goal posts have been moved several yards in the last three years since war was declared on 25% of us.

There are also those landlords who hold late night lock-ins by way of trying to keep our custom and if they fall foul of the law and get horrendous fines and penalties, who will help them if we don't?

Now, obviously, it is a very valid point that we should not encourage law breaking but surely we don't want to encourage compliance either or what is the point of a movement and what sort of teeth will it have? My view is that we need to send a message to Govt and to the Jobsworths that we support the people they are targeting and not them.

This may result in fine after fine after fine going into the treasury's coffers, but isn't that in itself a form of protest? It's like saying we don't agree with you and we don't see why this person you are punishing should have anything to fear or anything to feel guilty about.

I know opinion is divided on this issue so it seemed a good idea to find out what people think generally before setting up the PayPal account.

Further down on this blog, I wrote about how a woman who dropped a cig end out of her car window twice was fined almost £300 after being followed to work by a Jobsworth. I, personally, don't care that she did it twice. Dropping a cig end is like dropping a leaf - plant matter - and nature turfs millions of those everywhere every year in Autumn. By the time spring comes, they are biodegraded and by then any cig end is long gone. The true aim here in setting the weight of law on a person like this is really to further the denormalisation and humiliation process.

The other issue here is how, without funding, any person could fight such cases in a court of law. After all, if a jobsworth approached me, I'd want to see the cig end and have it tested for my DNA before I'd accept it as mine.

Thanks to the last bigoted Govt, legal aid has been cut back so far, you'd have to pretty much be charged with something like murder before you could take advantage of it. What hope has any smoker who chooses to plead not guilty got when faced with the expertise of a legally trained prosecutor in a place that the law-abiding feel intimidated in?

The fund, I should add, and I think we'd all agree, should not be used to bail out anyone charged with those offences such as assault which were in place before July 2007 even if it is because of a smoking related incident. Neither should any fund help anyone stupid enough to sell fags to the under age.

Anyway, thoughts on such matters above, and whether there should be a fund like this to help normally law-abiding smokers who have fallen foul of bad laws that we all want challenged, is a matter for discussion. So let me know your views and then we can - or won't - take this fund further.

After all, the success of this type of fund depends solely on those who would support it and pay into it on a regular basis.

JOIN THE RESISTANCE

It's useful to see this weird little street sign has appeared in the centre of my city directly outside of the NHS Stop Smoking services in a building that also invites people with sexually transmitted infections to seek the services of the NHS. Charming!

I always make a point of standing oustide of this building at lunchtime as I enjoy my Lincolnshire sausage bap, cup of tea, and at least two smokes outside of its front door.

I've never seen many people in there and personally one doesn't know whether the customer is there to quit or to seek help and advice for the pox.

But as I'm getting a tad rebellious in my older age, and this new Speaker's Corner facility, is right outside of the place that deserves some protest, I'm aiming to spread the word about our Resistance Movement which aims to starve such organisations of our tax which we will no longer pay because of our refusal to buy tobacco in the UK.

Oh, yes. I want a Join the Resistance Pirate Poster on a wooden placard and lots of leaflets explaining the campaign to the many smokers I see passing by this building most days.

And as my local council has seen fit to provide a place where, allegedly, freedom of speech can take place, then I plan to stand outside shouting "Stop funding the anti-smoking industry. Join the Resistance!"

So can someone tell me where I can get my hands on as many leaflets that I'll need and that big poster? Oh my, this is going to be such fun :)

MP TRUE TO HIS WORD

Sometime last February, when I was working on a local paper, I had the opportunity to interview Gainsborough MP Edward Leigh and I couldn't resist asking for his views on the smoking ban.

Mr Leigh said he missed cozy pubs which he believed had disappeared because of the ban.

So, I have to say that it's great to see an MP who indeed is true to his word and one of only 23 so far to sign fellow MP Brian Binley's EDM to reintroduce choice to landlords.

I know some Gainsborough people in the pro-choice movement who were never very sure of Mr Leigh and his view on this issue. It's safe to say he is a man worth voting for.

Indifference

Attractive pub in a prominent location, with an extensive food menu. Not as busy as you think it should be, but then again, when are most pubs busy nowadays apart from Friday nights? “Pint of bitter, please.” The barman serves it, looking mildly aggrieved that you’ve asked him to do some work. Glass full of bubbles, slowly starts to clear from the bottom, but it’s not crystal. Grip the glass, and your heart sinks, as it’s room temperature, whereas with a decent pint of cask beer you would expect some sensation of coolness. It’s probably the first pint of cask sold that session, although the pub has been open for an hour and a half. Once the pint has cleared, it retains a slight but discernible haze and, while the beer’s not off as such, it’s distinctly tired, end-of-barrelish and lacking condition. In a pub where you were known, you might well mention to the licensee that the beer was a bit below par, but here there’s no point; you just drink it, put the glass back on the bar and leave. Not the best way of spending £2.60 of your hard-earned cash. You won’t be going there again in a hurry, and if social events took you there, and you weren’t a diehard cask drinker, you’d probably choose smooth, or lager, or Guinness. Regrettably, while there are pubs where you can be confident that won’t happen, it’s all too typical of the experience of ordering a pint of cask beer in random pubs at quieter times.

OOH - THE LICCLE LIARS!

Following on from yesterday's post below, I note that CRUK is bleating through a press release that most people want something done about tobacco on display in shops.

Ermmm - if that really is the case then how come Express newspapers has launched a "Shutters Down" campaign to raise awareness of how we are in danger of losing our small shops because of the tobacco display ban which the group is completely against and aims to fight. Woo-hoo at last we have an MSM on our side! See the link to the same story in the post below about the ASH ban funding terrorism.

Now, surely, if "most people" want something "done" about this, then the Express group has surely just alienated most of its readership.

The CRUKs are just lying again, methinks, with their propaganda press release but how tiresome it is becoming and finally the MSM is waking up.

ASH BAN FUNDS TERRORISM

So ASH are stamping their feet and demanding a tobacco display ban.

Perhaps they should be warned that THIS could be the result.

Does the NuGovt really want to take the risk of falling for ASH's folly in the face of such warnings - especially given that they lied to push through this particular bad economic idea?

Now supporting it in the face of these warnings would be an act of monumental stupidity, would it not?

RIP ALEX

I was very sad to hear this news this evening.

My former partner, who I sincerely loved dearly, was a bit like Alex Higgins. He liked his drink more than his smoke but a hard living man he was and no-one could tell him how to live.

He was so scared, however, of the doctors that when he got throat cancer, he ran out of the back door as the ambulance arrived at the front to take him away. He was 54 when he died.

He believed that fate would have it that way and that was nature's way. All sorts of things were done to make him try and stop drinking and live more healhily, but he lived his life as he loved it and was quite prepared to accept the consequences.

"Life is about quality, not quantity, my angel," he would say. Yes, he was a man with the same kind of violent outbursts as Alex as well, which I couldn't live with. But I would never try to make him into a person he was not. I had a choice. My choice was to leave.

I suspect that like Alex Higgins, he was happy with his lot, and like Alex, he will never be forgotten.

RIP Alex Higgins -

Gimme shelter revisited

Last year I wrote about how few pubs had made much of an effort in providing smoking shelters. But I said in the comments “I think it will slowly come, as the better-run, more forward-looking pubs realise that they need to cater for all their customers,” and since then I’ve noticed quite a lot of investment going on in this area. For example, the Railway at Rose Hill now has a very smart elevated, covered area of wooden decking at the rear, while the beer garden at the Armoury in Edgeley, once little more than a patch of grass, now has two substantial separate shelters and bears a distinct resemblance to a grotto. I’ve seen several pubs with a notice outside advertising, amongst other facilities, “Covered, heated smoking patio” – so it’s becoming an important point of differentiation. No doubt the Righteous will moan about the patio heaters causing global warming, but they should have thought about that before imposing the smoking ban in the first place.

I was talking to a smoker who still does go to pubs, and he said that it’s very clear which pubs, within the current law, extend a welcome to him, and which don’t, and that obviously influences his choice of where to give his custom.

THE END GAME BECOMES CLEAR

Back in the mid 1990s, I used to write a paid for health supplement for a local paper.

This used to feature such things as arts projects involving people with a mental handicap (sorry no PC here!), new staff appointments, and various health related bits of information such as how to deal with flu. Very useful stuff and no propaganda unless you call promoting things like a breast cancer awareness propaganda but then it was very informative too.

You see, back then there was no hatred of smokers. We were allowed choice even if we were constantly told that what we did was bad for us. The loons who believed the scam of passive smoking were very much a minority in those days although it's fair to say their nonsense was taking ground.

Before I took on the writing of this supplement, I saw each year the huge No Smoking Day promotional stuff which only ever presented one side of the debate and even then it used to wind me up. So when the day came around during my time, I told my editor that I simply could not write it unless the perspective from the smoker was featured alongside it. I said, after all, that as a journalist, I had a duty to add balance.

The editor wasn't so sure because she said it was paid for. Basically the then health authority decided what went in and what didnt so I was advised to speak to the health promotions officer whose remit included such things as AIDS awareness as well.

He ummed and ahhed a bit but then said : "Why not. We know there is a bastion of hardened smokers who don't take on board what we say and we will never reach them. It will be interesting to see how they think."

By the end of the 90s, the pressure to quit really began to squeeze smokers. No longer could they be afforded a sealed room inside hospitals, for example, and soon after banning them from inside, the hospital tried to stop them smoking outside by calling them filthy, dangerous to others, and well, just damn untidy standing around in nightgowns etc..

The war suddenly changed from trying to get us onside, to a kill or cure attack method to eradicate us.

Black market tobacco began to surface, I think, here, anyway, in the early 1990s when the EU border rules changed. I find it odd, that the anti-smoking industry is only now trying to get to grips with it. But the truth is that the Black Market has thrived simply because of the anti-smoking industry's pressure on govt to hike tax on fags so high few can afford to buy them.

The end game for smokers is now in sight. That's why the idiotic campaign by Smoke Free North West uses lies and misinformation in a bid to criminalise those they cannot reach - The 25% of hardened smokers - without having to explain where the figure pulled from thin air of 75% comes from.

So when you see statements such as "75% of people want something doing about this," you know that they are trying very hard to marginalise the 25% of law abiding smokers.

The claim that "fake" tobacco is doing the rounds is yet another lie. There is nothing fake about it except that it is being dealt to the customer through the manwithavan rather than Govt. The baccy is real enough. I've seen it and tasted it.

Personally I don't buy Black Market baccy because I simply don't know where to get it from - certainly our ice cream man doesn't sell it - but I do have friends and acquaintances who do. They buy from other friends and acquaintances who legally go abroad on holiday and think of their friends while there and buy a few packets to share. After all, we're poor, and they do us all a favour. The smoke free bigots also claim it is foreign. Of course it is. It comes from abroad. I should add that I know of none who would sell to kids. It's simply not worth wasting when it is so scarce anyway. Do the smoke-free wallies really think we're that stupid - oh, yes, of course they do. We're smokers.

History shows us that when tobacco tax gets hiked, people don't stop smoking, they find cheaper ways of getting tobacco. Back in the 16th century, King Charles*, who personally hated tobacco and believed it made smoker's brains black, banned it in all London alehouses. He also hiked up the price something silly like 1000% The result was the peasants began to grow their own and the loss to the treasury was so great, he had to rethink his policy for the good of the country.

I say take heed politicians. We smokers will not be eradicated however much lying propaganda is put out about us. However much you try and criminalise us, demoralise us, eradicate us, we will continue smoking. And we intend to hit back by buying our tobacco abroad legally for personal use so that our taxes are no longer used against us to fund the lies and misinformation from the anti-smoking-smoke-free-ASH self interest industry.

Join the Resistance! Stop buying UK tobacco and cigarettes. Do not fund the anti-smoking industry any longer. Enough is Enough.

* NOTE - Sorry, I can't remember if it was Charles I or II and I don't have time today to look it up but anyone who doubts my word check out Chris Snowdon's excellent book - Velvet Glove, Iron Fist from the link on this blog on the left.

ASH SPOOF BLOG PINS DOWN LIES

News that ASH Scotland's main harridan Shiela Duffy now has her own blog has been met with astonishment that she closed the comments which is just not part of blogging etiquette.

With this in mind, someone has set up a spoof copy to enable people to take her to task for her lies and misinformation.

A lot of the comments HERE are angry ones and not related particularly to the debate of how ASH conned the public with false information on the tobacco display ban but fair enough.

We have taken insult after insult from this organisation so I, for one, have no problem in seeing them get back some of the anger they have created in their long history of lying.

At least Ms Duffy can't get away with just telling us what to do and how to think based on her blog. We will have our say!

Freedom of association

I have just concluded a poll asking the question “Should private members’ clubs be allowed to offer indoor smoking areas?” The result, with 95 people voting, was pretty decisive:

Yes: 81 (85%)
No: 14 (15%)

I’ve already made the argument in favour of this here.

More Famous People

Many people have family members, friends, and mentors who have influenced us one way or another.  If you would like to give me information and a picture of a family member or friend, I would love to post it so that the world can see them.  My email address is josephjohnson99@msn.com please dont hesitate any information will do.

General John Buford, Jr.

John Buford, Jr. (March 4, 1826 – December 16, 1863) was a West Point graduate and a native of Kentucky who remained in the United States Army though many of his relatives and classmates chose to join the Confederate cause. During the American Civil War, Buford served as a Union cavalry officer. He discharged his duty with distinction at the Second Battle of Bull Run (Manassas). He also fought at South Mountain and Antietam.

Buford is credited with having chosen the field of battle at Gettysburg. Although greatly outnumbered, Buford, a Brigadier General at the time, deployed his dismounted cavalry on McPherson Ridge to impede the Confederate advance led by his West Point classmate, Major General Henry Heth, until 1 Corp under Major General John F. Reynolds arrived to support the Union position. When Confederate General Robert E. Lee retreated back to Virginia after being soundly defeated at Gettysburg, Buford pursued Lee into Virginia, engaging the Confederates in several battles.

In December, 1863, Abraham Lincoln approved Buford’s promotion to Major General on the eve of Buford’s death from a disease, probably typhoid. He was buried at West Point. A fort in North Dakota and a town in Wyoming were named in his honor.

In error I did not attribute this articule to the man who gave me the article to fix that error I am attributing this article to whom it belongs.

{Article Attributed to}
 Rev. Wesley Kan 

A price worth paying?

Critics of the proposed reduction of the drink-drive limit point out the impact it would have on rural pubs and on rural social life in general (and in this context, “rural” means anywhere outside of big towns, not just the deep countryside). In the past, I have seen suggestions that an 80-50 limit cut could result in the closure of up to ten thousand pubs, although some of them may now already have been accounted for by the smoking ban. 7,500 is more likely. It scarcely needs repeating that pubs are widely valued as social centres and a cohesive point for village and rural communities.

The North Report acknowledges this but doesn’t really properly address it:

There were concerns expressed about the impact of a reduced blood alcohol limit on the drinks industry. The British Beer and Pub Association was particularly concerned about the impact on rural pubs, saying that drivers would be reluctant to go out to pubs which involved driving and would be reluctant to go for meals in groups where the driver could not drink. The Association said, “Lowering the BAC limit will therefore have significant impact on footfall in rural food-led pubs resulting in loss of sales across all areas, but especially food”. Their concern was heightened because of the particular reliance of many pubs on food to maintain their profitability. The Association went on to calculate that if one-third of those currently arriving at pubs by car chose not to go, pubs would lose £624 million a year. This was hugely significant, they said, because pubs were closing at the rate of 39 per week. The consequent loss of duty would also impact upon the Exchequer. This concern for pubs, and rural pubs and their place in rural life, was shared by others in the industry who gave evidence to the Review, with the Federation of Licensed Victuallers Associations, for example, writing in very similar terms.

Any policy proposal that is likely to make large numbers of lawful businesses unviable and result in a serious detriment to rural communities should not be allowed to go through on the nod. Surely there needs to be a detailed investigation of the effect that reducing the limit might have on rural pubs and communities. It may be a price worth paying, but that price needs to be quantified.

It is always difficult to forecast the effect of any legislative change on the licensed trade, particularly as it has long been characterised by the triumph of hope over experience. For example, while the smoking ban has undoubtedly led to the closure of large numbers of pubs, some of the pubs that had seemed most vulnerable – landlocked, no outside drinking space, no food trade – are still in business.

However, looking at the proportion of customers of a pub eating meals, in conjunction with the proportion arriving by car, will give a reasonable impression of the potential effect of a limit cut on any particular pub. A pub with entirely wet trade and all customers arriving by car will have no chance. But a pub with 75% dining, and 65% arriving by car, will be in a better position than one with 10% dining, but 45% arriving by car. People will be much more likely to continue to visit pubs to eat meals and drink less than they will be just to have a drink and a chat. Also those eating meals are more likely to travel in groups where the driver may not feel he is making too much of a sacrifice by being abstemious.

Anything with under 25% arriving by car would have little to worry about – which underlines the sense behind Wetherspoons’ long-standing policy of concentrating on town-centre sites, even if at times it may have given the impression they were ducking competition and limiting their options.

As with the smoking ban, the effect on pubs would be slower and more insidious than might be supposed, and likely to take at least five years to work itself out, as licensees try new ideas and formulas in a usually futile attempt to attract new custom. There are plenty of pubs that in the long run have been made unviable by the smoking ban, but are still open and struggling along. But the idea that it wouldn’t close pubs at all, or that the effect would be trivial, is simply incredible.

IS IT DANGEROUS FOR LIFELONG SMOKERS TO QUIT?

I don't think there's been any research into the effects of quitting after a lifetime of smoking but I have heard plenty of evidence of people who have smoked from childhood to old age who give up and then suddenly drop dead.

And judging from this graph it would appear that lung cancer affects those who quit more than those who don't.

I am rather persuaded by the Tory personal responsibility for one's own health idea and I certainly know who has my best health interests at heart. Me.

The years I have smoked are part of the reason why I would never quit - certainly not until some proper research has been done that indicates what might happen if I did.

My mother - who didn't start smoking until she was in her 30s, smoked while I was in her womb. I took up the habit at 8 years old. That is a lot of years smoking and a body that has evolved around tobacco smoke.

If I suddenly stopped would my body then give up because it isn't getting a vital component that it has been used to all it's life from conception to middle age with a short break between?

Of course I'll never know because lung cancer, for example, is the least funded when it comes to cancer research which really is about just funding anti-smoking projects and not serious research into what happens when lifelong smokers quit.

FACT AND LOONS

I was going to write about the psychopathic (I,m told I have to make my opinion based on fact clear for those who are too stupid to distinguish between the two) ranters in the comments section of the Daily Mail but Dick Puddlecote describes it far better than I could.

While these idiots (opinion)who are so health obsessed (opinion) that they believe the crap on 3rd hand smoke (opinion) astounds me. (Fact.)

Meanwhile one of the orchestrators (fact) of the scam (fact) that is third hand smoke Shiela Duffy at ASH has started her own blog which doesn't welcome debate. (fact)

My guess (obviously opinion) is that she's scared (opinion) of debate in case the arguments used to encourage the above loons (opinion) soon begin to fall apart (Fact.)

I hope I've made myself clear.

JOIN THE RESISTANCE

I also meant to blog about this yesterday over at the Nothing2Declare blog but got diverted.

It's a great campaign and a legal and effective way of showing the Government that we have had enough and we will no longer pay for our own persecution.

Buy abroad, starve the treasury of tax. Join the Resistance.

COMMON SENSE FROM FOREST

Well done Simon Clark over at Taking Liberties for his excellent response to the Mirror article about actress Billie Piper smoking outside a pub when a child was nearby.

His words make common sense - despite the fact that he was misquoted - as opposed to the righteous ranting of the anti who uses the same old blah-de-blah crap about the "4,000" chemicals etc... Yawnnnn

Of course these "4,000" chemicals can be found in just about all things around us today although in tobacco, they have a much lower risk factor than those exaggerated by the anti-smoking industry and nowhere near as harmful as those found in everyday cleaning products for example.

There is also Rich White's excellent book which puts the risk of chemicals in tobacco into its true perspective.

It also nice to see over at Simon's blog that the Save Our Pubs and Clubs amendthesmokingban.com campaign has stepped up a gear.

For those of you who don't me, I am in the group photograph, with dark hair, next to the blonde lady on one side and Anthony Worrall Thompson on the other.

Lansley talks sense

There was an encouraging outbreak of common sense recently from Health Secretary Andrew Lansley in his evidence to the House of Commons Health Committee on the issue of minimum alcohol pricing:

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has again ruled out minimum pricing, arguing it would have an “unwelcome” impact on low-income families.

Giving evidence to the Health Committee yesterday, Lansley admitted the idea that the price of alcohol affected demand was unquestionable.

But he added: “The evidence does not support minimum unit pricing as the mechanism to deliver a price adjustment that best impacts on demand and does not as a consequence have unwelcome, regressive impacts in terms of low-income households.”

Good to see that he recognises that a minimum pricing regime which sought to increase the price of everyday off-trade alcohol purchases would have a negative impact on responsible drinkers on low incomes.

Given that he recently also said that people had to take responsibility for their own health rather than being told how to live by government, this gives mild grounds for encouragement.

It’s interesting that his inquisitor was Dr Sarah Wollaston, the Tory MP for Totnes and a former GP, who was selected by an “open primary” of all electors and on this issue at least does not appear to have very “Tory” instincts.

JOBSWORTH STALKS SMOKER

I am astounded. Following on from yesterday's post about the women facing charges for dropping a cigarette end twice, I can now report that she was indeed stalked by a Jobsworth who actually had the audacity to brag about it in court before proceedings began.

The case against the lady in question resulted in total fines, costs and "victim surcharge" of £290. Obviously there is more to gain financially from prosecuting smokers than there is from the tax on each packet of fags they buy.

The court heard how the smoke policeman was in a car behind this lady when he saw her drop her fag end out of the window. I guess this must have irked him and played on his mind because a couple of weeks later, he saw her car again, saw her drop a cig end, but this time he followed, parked up where she did, and then went into her place of work to issue a £50 fixed penalty notice.

I went round to see the lady at home after the case. She wasn't there but her friend told me that she didn't have the money to pay. She didn't appear at court because she had a medical problem due to an allergy. The case was proved in her absence after the Lincoln City Council prosecutor gave the "facts" as given to her by the jobsworth.

What I would say to all smokers who find themselves in a similar position is to make sure you do appear in court and plead not guilty unless the alleged cigarette end is produced as evidence and it has been tested for your DNA. After all, in this case, it doesn't appear that the Jobsworth picked up the cig end. The court just took his word for what happened and there was no one there to challenge it.

And be sure to look behind you in the car or on the street as you smoke because you just don't know who might be watching with pen and clipboard in hand.

It would be great if the Pro-Choice movement had a fund to support these law abiding people who fall foul of bad legislation which is more about tax collection than "justice". If anyone wants to help this lady pay her fine, as they did for landlord Nick Hogan, then let me know.

I have no regular work at present but I'd be happy to put a tenner in the pot. Are there 289 other people who would like to donate the same?

A dozen reasons to stub out the smoking ban

Taken from Sp!ked, musician Joe Jackson explains why it's time to extinguish this illiberal, undemocratic, junk science-inspired legislation.

What is needed is not just the repeal of the smoking ban and other illiberal laws, but a return to healthy scepticism about the claims made about various risks, fairness and tolerance towards others with different habits, and a large dose of common sense.

Sugarwater

The article I linked to last week about hoppy mid-Atlantic pale ales brought to mind an indigenous beer style similar in colour but rather more subtle in flavour – pale, sweetish West Midlands bitters and light milds. In the current edition of the CAMRA newspaper What’s Brewing, Roger Protz reports how the historic Three Tuns home brew pub at Bishop’s Castle in Shropshire has been brought back to life. The core of their beer range is XXX bitter, which he describes as “a pale, all-malt beer, hopped with Fuggles from Worcestershire, soft and malty, with a fruity nose and hop bitterness coming through in the mouth and finish.” Lovely.

The brews produced by the other two historic home-brew pubs in the broader West Midlands area – the All Nations at Madeley in Shropshire and the Swan (Ma Pardoe’s) at Netherton near Dudley, although weaker, were broadly similar – pale, easy-drinking, soft-flavoured and subtle. And finest of the lot is Batham’s Best Bitter, also from the Black Country not too far from Netherton. As well as their own small tied estate, this is sold in the Great Western in Wolverhampton, a Holden’s tied house, and I always enjoy a pint when I go in there. Famously dismissed as “sugarwater” by CAMRA stalwart Ivor Clissold many years ago, to my mind this is one of Britain’s great beers. Holden’s own bitter, although a little darker and more robust, is fairly similar too.

And it could be argued that the unlamented M&B Brew XI, being a palish, sweetish bitter, also fell into broadly the same style, although a much inferior product that never in my experience rose above tolerable. It always seemed to have a kind of heaviness and thickness to it quite unlike the delicacy of beers such as Batham’s. In the late 70s, Brew XI was ubiquitous across large swathes of the Midlands – was there ever a cask beer that was so widely available but so little regarded? According to the 2010 Good Beer Guide it is now brewed under contract by Everards, but I haven’t seen it in years and even if I did it would be one of the last beers on the bar I would choose.

ACCEPTABLE DISCRIMINATION?

I assume this kind of discrimination is perfectly acceptable and I doubt that anyone would get involved in helping to redress gender equality here.

My guess is that if it was any other subject, there would be an outcry.

NEW BLOGROLL ADDITION

This makes amusing yet terrifying reading and is a new addition to my Blogroll.

All I can say is that it's a damn good job I don't use filters.

PERSECUTION OF SMOKERS MUST END

This link shows the place where someone committed the most henious crime of this century, allegedly anyway.

And as I aim to go to the court tomorrow to see this most anti-social pariah get her just deserts for throwing away on the busy street a cigarette end that, let's not forget, is entirely biodegradable, I'll report back when I know how the case ended. And as my MP Karl McCartney is a magistrate, I'd be very interested to see if he sits on the bench in this case and what his reaction is to this huge waste of public resources.

I think the greater public interest concern here is how much has this case cost to take to court? How much does Lincoln City Council - oops - the pretentious freaks prefer City of Lincoln Council and paid an arm and a leg to get the name change - pay for what I assume is the smoke police to stalk this woman. Reading between the lines of the charges, it would appear she was followed because the second charge relates to dropping a cigarette end on one of the most congested and, it is fair to say scruffy roads in Lincoln

It seems incredible that the country has come to this and employs such petty persecution against it's citizens -but at what cost to them? Certainly in London smoke police are paid £44,000 a year. Is that amount of public money really worth it when all they seem to do is stalk innocent law abiding people who smoke? I pay my taxes in this city and I do not want them wasted in this way. I wonder what plans the ConDems have in mind as far as this piece of NuLab persecution goes.

It's time it ended.

This poor woman accused of this "at Brayford Way Lincoln in the county of Lincolnshire threw down, dropped or otherwise deposited litter, namely a cigarette
butt and left it in Brayford Way Lincoln a place to which section 87 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 applied. Contrary to section 87(1) and (5) of the Environmental Protection Act and at The Avenue Lincoln in the county of Lincolnshire
threw down, dropped or otherwise deposited litter, namely a cigarette
butt and left it in The Avenue Lincoln a place to which section 87
of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 applied.
Contrary to section 87(1) and (5) of the Environmental Protection Act
1990. The defendant threw down, dropped or otherwise deposited a cigarette butt at The Avenue Lincoln and left."

"THE DEFENDANT" !! If this is not an example of innocent smokers being criminalised, then I'm not sure what is.

Personally, I always carry a pocket ashtray because I won't let these Nazis persecute me for enjoying my biodegradable cigarette. It's a shame the anti-smoking propaganda put out by the last corrupt Govt didn't encourage more use of these things. But then, why would it, when we all know what a great cash cow smokers have become and how much of a target for hate they have been labelled.

Yep - I'll be watching very closely how this new Govt treats smokers generally and it could start by taking a whole new approach to educating smokers about litter. Education not persecution is the right way forward but I guess we will have to wait and see.

AN OPEN LETTER

Above is my reply from my MP Karl McCartney in response to my request that he support Brian Binley MP's EDM to amend the smoking ban.

Spoken like a true politician, he doesn't commit himself. He says he believes that landlords have the right to choose, yet he quotes the old statistics of the number of people who have allegedly quit up to 2007.

Mr McCartney, I would like to point out that we are three years on from the ban and smoking rates are rising.

this shows how NRT only has a "success" rate of 5% so hard pressed tax payers give the NHS a budget of £50 million and £47.5 million is a wasted. You see, Mr McCartney, there really are some people who do not want to quit and they should not be ignored.

This shows how deceitful the tobacco control lobby is and the underhanded methods they use to con government and the public. Will the Conservatives be stupid enough to fall for more of their lies?

And, yes, Mr McCartney, I do indeed feel very strongly about this issue but that should not invalidate my concerns. If strongly held views were a reason to dismiss such concerns, then how is it that the tobacco control industry - which feels very strongly about the issue - is always listened to yet the other side is always ignored.

You may say that smokers are fighting their corner because they are "addicts" this link clearly puts that lie to bed once for all. "Addiction" to tobacco is yet another lie of the deceitful anti-smoking industry which uses it to denigrate smokers and encourage intolerance against them.

Finally, Mr McCartney, I draw to your attention your immigration minister Damien Green's comments on calls to ban the burka. He said "freedom of choice and tolerance is the British way." I would like to think that you also ascribe to this view and are not selective about who is entitled to it and who is not. I actually agree with Mr Green and have always said I would fight for the right of muslim women to wear the burka if that is what they choose to do.

I find it encouraging that you say you believe in a landlord's right to choose, and I assume you also mean the smoker's right to choose, but hear what you say about EDM's not being the most effective way of achieving an aim. With this in mind, perhaps you would like to lend your support to FOREST'S Save Our Pubs and Clubs, amendthesmoking ban.com

Yours Sincerely,
Mrs Patricia Nurse.

FREEDOM OF CHOICE AND TOLERANCE

So, Damien Green has dismissed a ban on the burka because he says it is a matter of choice. "Freedom, choice and tolerance is the British way", is what I heard on the news last night.

Errr - could you repeat that please Mr Green?

"Freedom of choice and tolerance is the British way..."

Perhaps you could have a word in the Cam Moron's ear about that when it comes to the blanket smoking ban. All we ask is just that - freedom of choice and tolerance

Guerrilla marketing

The Observer reports with predictable outrage that tobacco companies are using “edge-of-the-law” tactics to get round the tobacco advertising ban and promote their products. Not surprisingly, ASH are yet again foaming at the mouth. But I say good luck to them – the blanket ban on tobacco advertising is an egregious violation of free speech, and one of the things Clegg should (but won’t) put at the top of the list for his Great Repeal Bill (which is increasingly looking as though it won’t repeal anything significant at all). If you ban something, you shouldn’t be surprised if those affected do their best to find ingenious ways of circumventing it.

Shelved

Good news that the coalition government are reported to be considering scrapping Labour’s plan to ban the display of tobacco products in shops. Not surprisingly, the likes of ASH have been foaming at the mouth with outrage. This was always an absurd, spiteful measure that would impose substantial costs on small retailers and restrict consumers’ access to information about the price and availability of a legal product while, paradoxically, if you believe the evidence from countries that have implemented it, doing nothing to achieve its stated aim of reducing the prevalence of smoking. According to Parminder Singh, president of the National Federation of Retail Newsagents:

“It is precisely the kind of measure that should be first in the deregulation firing line: unwanted, unworkable, unnecessarily costly for struggling small businesses and proven not to achieve its objectives.”

The elephant in the lounge bar

Some salutary words for the pub trade here from Chris Snowdon, in response to this article from Adam Fowle of M&B pleading for special favours from the government – the call of lame duck industries down the years. It’s funny how nobody seemed that bothered about supermarket drink prices before 1 July 2007, isn’t it? Chris concludes:

Consumers aren't stupid. They've always known that they can get their alcohol much more cheaply from the off-trade. They pay (or paid) a premium to go to the pub because pubs sell atmosphere, comfort, entertainment and relaxation. Above all, they sell an environment. That environment changed dramatically in July 2007. For some people, it was a change for the better, but every economic indicator suggests that for pubs' core customer base, it was a change for the worse. People will not pay a premium to stand out on the street. Whether that premium is £2 or 2p makes little difference when there is a comfy sofa and a roaring fire back at home.

So, yes, it's not pretty when business colludes with government, but it's understandable when business feels it can maximise its profits. But when years of collusion have led to nothing but the decimation of your industry, isn't it time to grow a pair?

The anti-drink lobby must be chortling into their sarsaparilla at the sight of sections of the drinks trade at each others’ throats.

NOT IN MY NAME

I am constantly fed up with the anti-smoking company ASH crowing that it speaks for smokers. It does not. It hates us.

It has literally turned my stomach to see their galling press releases that say such things "Smokers want more restrictions." No they don't and ASH does not speak for me or any other smoker.

This is the latest piece of propaganda that they have put out. Simon at Taking Liberties might think it's hilarious. Some might say desperate. ASH thinks it can trot out that somehow Big Tobacco is orchestrating the assault on the scam Freedom site when in fact the only orchestrating done on this issue is by ASH - the scam charity - instead.

And ASH's claim to speak for smokers is an insult, it's laughable. Politicians who believe this crap are even more stupid than I thought.

Let me make one thing clear - and I know it's how a lot of smokers feel - I hate Big Tobacco almost as much as ASH. If I could find a way of growing my own so I didn't have to put any money in BT's pocket then I would.

BT has done nothing for the smoker in standing against the smoking ban. They make more money from smoking bans because they are good for getting people smoking. In every country where bans have been imposed, smoking rates have gone up so why on earth should BT back our stance?

Back off ASH. You don't speak for me and you don't ask for more restrictions in my name.

DEFINITION OF A BIGOT - NAZI

I have to say that I entirely agree with this post from Mr Puddlecote.

I think Jon Gaunt should have been allowed to expose that Nazi councillor for the prejudicial freak that he obviously is. And yes, the Nazis were prejudicial freaks as you will read from the very eloquent way described in this excellent post if you haven't already.

Mid-Atlantic drinking

There’s an interesting article in the current issue of Opening Times – the Stockport & South Manchester CAMRA newsletter – by Gazza Prescott on the rise of pale, highly-hopped “mid-Atlantic” pale ales. There’s an extended version on Gazza’s website here.

Now Gazza is well known for his trenchant opinions, but this is an enthusiastic and readable survey of the development of this particular beer style. I have praised the likes of Oakham JHB and Thornbridge Jaipur on here before. It’s a bit much to say “Pale’n’hoppy beers are slowly taking over the beer culture of the UK”, although he does acknowledge that it is a phenomenon largely confined to specialist beer pubs. There isn’t much sign of these beers “going mainstream”. Realistically it is just adding another colour to the palette of British beer styles – I can’t really see them replacing the traditional balanced bitters in the general run of pubs.

It’s probably also fair to say that these beers are the beer world’s equivalent of highly-peated malt whiskies such as Laphroiag and Talisker – very well-respected, but too much biased towards one extreme end of the flavour spectrum to appeal to many people as a regular tipple. You might well enjoy one or two during an evening’s sampling of a variety of beers, but few would want to drink them all night.

It should be said that there is a marked difference between the kind of intensely hoppy beers Gazza is talking about and those “gold” beers with an insipid, floral hoppiness than can so easily become wishy-washy, which is what I was complaining about here.

TIME FOR ACTION - WAR DECLARED

I was never in doubt that these two jokers would ever care about the plight of a minority group unless that group has a legal tag on it such as "ethnic" "gay" or "wimmin" but now that they have declared war on a group fighting for the right to exist, the time for action has come.

Smokers still remain in their eyes the scum of the world who should be hounded out of existence for daring to disagree with the righteous health obsessed freaks, and for daring to like the smell of that which others turn their nose up at.

Smokers could not unite at election time even though it seemed to me an act of monumental stupidity to vote for any party that plans to continue the persecution. As it happens, some smokers were stupid enough to vote for two of them.

Perhaps I'm being harsh. After all Cleggy and the Moron did make whispered and disguised promises that there would be some amendment to the current stalinist regulations on smoking with the scam that was the Freedom Bill - or Great Repeal Bill shite which frankly will do nothing but make life easier for terrorists while law abiding people are criminalised.

Now that Cleggy has ruled out any amendment, the time has come to show him how much it matters.

Fuming smokers are now planning civil disobedience, but even then they are so politically diverse and fragmented that frankly they can't even agree on what sort of action to take. Some are talking of lighting up electric cigs in public - w0000 - scary - that'll show 'em - especially as there is nothing illegal about electric smoking in public. I've made my views known on that and why I think it's dividing smokers and strengthening the armoury of our enemies.

Our main lobby group is Forest which gets ignored far too often by those in power who have a duty to listen. And as much as Forest works hard for the smoker, and Simon Clark the director is more than able to respond to the anti-smoking industry's spin, I fear it is taking the wrong course of action and gives too many own goals to the other side especially with the use of language.

Now this tells of how the WHO buried scientific evidence that passive smoking does NOT cause cancer but has a protective effect. So why does Forest roll over on the issue of such things as car bans with language such as "smokers should err on the side of caution when children are present" No - we shouldn't because there is nothing to fear.

What we should do, and those of us who are polite smokers always have, is err on the side of good manners. We know that a minority of people don't like smoke and children can't always tell us that - especially if they are very young - so for the sake of consideration, smokers should not smoke in front of children until those children can express their likes and dislikes with language.

And now that the cat is out of the bag and the new ConDem party has shown it's disgust for smokers and refuses to listen to them, the time for action has come. It is the only way we will be heard but Forest, I doubt, would be keen to get involved.

Forest has said that it will not condone law breaking. I think it's a damn good job the women of the last century didn't take the same stance or - God Forbid - we would never have been treated to the delights of Harriet Harperson as a Govt minister.

Bad laws must be challenged and if Forest doesn't begin to challenge them by organising civil disobedience, then this won't get any better for us.

The organisation can rustle up hundreds of people for it's social events where we all get pissed and just forget about our persecution but it doesn't change a damn thing, and it could easily arrange a massive protest but it won't. Why? I have no idea.

So with the lack of any organised group to help us - apart from the more active but totally skint F2C - we don't have much of a chance of getting ourselves heard and showing these stupid and bigoted politicians that this issue really does matter.

With this in mind, I am looking for about 50 smokers for an act of civil disobedience which I promise will not get one pub landlord in trouble. Those willing to finally unite and make a stand, leave a comment here unless you know me and have my email address.

I was going to begin to put comment moderation on because I'm fed up with spammers and because I don't see why I should entertain anti-smokers on this blog anymore but I won't yet.

Meanwhile, Baz, and any other antis who drop by here, your comments on this particular post are not welcome. If one appears. It will be deleted.

Closing down the debate

Apparently fakecharity Alcohol Concern Wales want to have a “national debate” about the future of alcohol sales in petrol stations. This stems, they say, from continued concern about the high level of drink-related road accidents. But is there actually evidence that any such accidents have been caused by drivers who have bought alcohol from petrol forecourts and consumed it immediately afterwards? Also, in many areas of rural Wales, petrol stations may offer the only shop for miles around, so banning them from selling alcohol would be a significant detriment to local communities.

Of course, when such organisations call for a “debate” that is the last thing they want – they are seeking to impose their views on others. We saw exactly the same a year or so ago when health organisations staged the so-called “Big Drink Debate” which was really just an exercise in making moderate drinkers feel guilty. And isn’t the real motivation behind turning the spotlight on petrol stations just yet another niggly, salami-slicing, superficially reasonable-sounding bid to restrict the availability of alcoholic drinks?

Join the club

One aspect of the smoking ban which always seems particularly unreasonable is the prohibition of private clubs permitting smoking, something brought up the other day in the comments. Even if you take all the arguments about health and the protection of employees at face value (which of course I don’t), why in principle should a group of adult smokers, and tolerant non-smokers, not be allowed to set up a private licensed club where they could socialise, in the full knowledge of the potential risks they were exposing themselves to? Obviously under-18s would be strictly barred, and to prevent it having a wider appeal you could prevent the club selling food beyond crisps and nuts, or charging admission for entertainment. You could also prevent non-members being “signed in”, so nobody could visit on impulse.

Maybe it should also be a condition that such a smoking club could have no paid employees, with all the work done by the members on a voluntary basis – although, realistically, given that there are many jobs that involve a far greater and more demonstrable risk to health than working in a smoky club, I don’t see why there shouldn’t be paid employees. After all, in my experience a considerable majority of bar staff are smokers anyway.

Nobody who found smoking unpleasant or offensive or felt it was a risk to their health would ever need to cross the threshold of such an establishment. Nobody could claim it was the only place in town you could get a meal. I really can’t see how any reasonable person could object. If you don’t like kinky sex, you don’t go to fetish clubs. If you don’t like smoke, you don’t go to smoking clubs. Simple.

But perhaps the reason it’s not allowed is not philosophical principle, but the fear that such smoking clubs would become embarrassingly popular amongst non-smokers as well as smokers, thus taking away the vaunted “level playing field” for other businesses, and exposing the hollowness of claims that the ban enjoys overwhelming support. As I said in a previous post, in many spheres the way people vote with their feet can be much more significant than how they cast their ballot.

Practice what you preach

There have been predictable howls of outrage over the news that Tesco have been selling 75cl bottles of Bulgarian wine for a mere £1.11. It’s easy to condemn Sir Terry Leahy as a hypocrite for allowing this to happen while at the same time expressing support for minimum pricing and a ban on below-cost selling. But all he’s doing is what any canny businessman would do – trying to get the government to allow him and his competitors to set up a price-fixing cartel, but insisting he can’t move on his own as it would put Tesco at a disadvantage. He is following the precept of St Augustine, “Grant me chastity and continence, only not yet.”

And why are they selling wine at £1.11 a bottle anyway – because they’re lumbered with a surplus of stock they can’t shift (and I suspect bottles of Bulgarian Chardonnay that normally retail at £2.99 aren’t very palatable in the first place). So it makes sense, as it would with slow-selling packets of cereal or boxes of chocolates, to cut the price to get rid of it. Would it be better to simply pour it down the drain? The Righteous would probably say yes, of course. And, if such discounts were outlawed, the result would be obvious – smaller producers of alcoholic drinks of any kind would be expected to supply Tesco on a sale or return basis, or not at all.

Tyranny of the majority

Bad news from Bavaria that a referendum has voted by a 61% to 39% margin to impose a complete smoking ban in bars and restaurants. Some may hail this as democracy in action, but I had always thought that a fundamental principle of democracy was respect for the rights of minorities. Voting may be a good system for choosing MPs and councillors, but should voters be allowed to impose their own lifestyle preferences on others?

If you’re fond of the pongy ale, but most of the customers in your local pub prefer lager, should they be allowed to vote that everyone should drink lager?

Or, given that a large majority of people are heterosexual, would they be entitled to vote to outlaw homosexuality?

The report also shows the fallacious “level playing field” argument being trotted out again. In reality this is more of a “dog in the manger” argument. Surely hospitality businesses are entitled to offer a range of services and facilities as they see fit, and stand or fall as to how popular those prove with the paying public. If businesses with smoking bans feel disadvantaged because those permitting smoking do better, doesn’t that demonstrate that there is little genuine public demand for the bans? The real test of public opinion is not so much how people cast their ballots, but how they vote with their feet.

AND WHILE I'M ON THE SUBJECT

I also hate banks.

Mine wrote to me today to say it will no longer pay interest on many of their accounts which are in credit. Two of mine are affected. Who wants to bet they haven't abolished taking interest in loans or overdrafts?

It brings to mind a story I was told last week by a young family with one small child. They struggle on a hand to mouth state existence and both the mum and dad desperately want jobs but without skills, and in a city full of cheap students willing to work at odd hours and migrants taking up the kind of unskilled work they would once have done, they can't get work.

They inadvertently went 35 pence over drawn at the bank the other week. They have no choice but for their meagre benefit to be paid into a bank account anymore. As a result, they found a week later that the bank was charging them £60 for the mistake. This when the couple don't even have an overdraft facility.

This couple was lucky because they had family who would help them out of this mess. Had they not, the £60 week benefit that they live on would have been paid in, swallowed up by the thieving bank, and their child would have gone hungry. No doubt they would then have been persecuted by the state for child neglect and basically just for being poor.

It all stinks. That is NuLab's legacy. Persecution of the poor that the party was originally founded to help. Don't they make you sick. Do I expect things to be different for those on low income under the ConDem party? Absolutely not. I fear that people are going to die under this adminstration simply because they can't afford to live and this new adminstration doesn't care as long as it can save money.

WHY I HATE DENTISTS

They are money grabbing con-artists who don't give a damn if you're teeth are about to fall out unless you can pay them an arm or a leg and then, in my own experiences, they ruin them for life.

And this has just given me more reasons to despise the profession

The idea behind this scheme is obviously to further denormalise and humiliate smokers into quitting when we know all these conditions put down to just smokers affect people whether they smoke or not. Most of these conditions, such as "stained teeth" and "halitosis" and "hairy tongue" are usually the result of smokers and non-smokers not brushing their teeth.

Staining can also be caused by other things such as drinking a lot of red wine and gum disease is hereditary. Our dictatorial masters in the last Govt paid millions, you may recall, for an ad campaign warning drinkers that they are an exaggerated amount of times more likely to get oral cancer if they have more units of alcohol than nanny advises.

Back in the good old days when dentistry was free on the NHS, and dentists got loads of dosh from the state, they were calling us in for check ups every six months. I never had a problem with my teeth but every six months they would fill one - or two or even three.

When the old fillings I had from my youth began to wear in the 80s the dentist started filling them with gold.

"I can't possibly afford that," I said at the time the then dentist suggested it.

"Don't worry. The NHS will pay," he said and he didn't care as long as the cash rolled in.

Low and behold, after all my teeth were filled - with mercury I might add - they then wanted to start pulling them. This was a step too far. I changed my dentist, got a second opinion and was told my teeth were fine. I've still got 'em all.

Then NuLab came in and priced the poor out of dentistry in the same way they priced them out of Higher Education. The truth is, I can no longer afford to go to the dentist and neither can many people I know who have been so desperate for dental care they have resorted to such things as bleaching their teeth to remove stains, using superglue to stick loose crowns back in, and even pulling their teeth themselves.

My family - except me and a non-smoking sister - all lost their teeth because they all succumbed to inherited gum disease which has passed down to one of my non-smoking daughters who has to pay £1000 every three months for treatment for the rest of her life.

I have a troublesome front tooth which needed a crown after I got smacked in the mouth once and it needs attention but I know it won't get it until dentistry becomes affordable again and, I should add, smokers are treated equally. Being a smoker means I would rather die than access any healthcare. If I get ill, I will die because I will not seek help from a health service that despises me. Rest assured, antis, this smoker will not spend even £1 at your mealy mouthed expense to seek medical treatment for any serious illness - even if I have paid all of my life for the privilege.

Schemes such as those offered in Kent won't help anything but to incite more disgust at smokers. It should be illegal and dentists should be the ones who are criminalised and humiliated by the state.