BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Alice
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 09:50 AM

No, it is not like saying that.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 09:52 AM

THE landlords of a Suffolk pub have become the first victims of the smoking ban - and last night a campaign group predicted that hundreds of pubs across the country will close as a result of the controversial crackdown.

After more than two years running the Greene King-owned Elephant and Castle in Hospital Road, Bury St Edmunds, licensees Marian and Gareth Thomas have decided to call time on their business.

The couple, who had their plans for a smoking shelter outside the pub turned down, claim the smoking ban was the final straw.
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 10:25 AM

Skipy - You win. I can see that you will not be phased by rhyme nor reason. Neither will you let a few simple facts cloud your arguments. Let me just have one last try on this thread. Pubs have been loosing trade for years. The smoking ban may or may not have pushed some of them over the edge. It is not however the sole cause of them closing. Those that have and will close, will have closed anyway. Not a one that you mention up to now has been doing particularly well. All the smoking ban has done is speeded up the inevitable. Give us just one instance of a pub that was doing well before, losing all it's trade on July the 1st.

Anyhow, to my mind the number of people that benefit from the ban is far greater than those who lose out. And I don't just mean the 60-odd% who don't smoke having precidence over the 30-odd% who do. I am talking about the countless families who will be happy seeing their loved ones live rather than die a horrible lung disease related death. There can be no way of measuring that against the exeedingly small sacrifice that smokers have to make when they nip out for a fag.

Carry on and publish all the closures that the popular press and biased media can muster. Someone else can give the facts from the other side. I am fed up of banging my head on a wall. Tell you what though. I shall still be sat in the smoke free singaround while you stand outside with another coffin nail.

Good luck.

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: webfolk
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 11:00 AM

Grab wrote,
"it's impossible to talk about no-smoking pubs without mentioning Wetherspoons, where every single pub in Britain's biggest chain of pubs has been no-smoking for as long as I can remember"

not near me they weren't.

Geoff
www.webfolk.net

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Midchuck
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 11:17 AM

Bat Goddess said:

New Hampshire is surrounded by states that banned smoking in public places several years ago (like Maine), but didn't finally pass anti-smoking legislation until recently. It won't take effect for another couple months. The thing is, I know of a lot of people who follow our music, but won't come to The Press Room now because of the smoke level (even with smoke eaters). They WILL come (and drink! and eat) when the venue is smoke-free.

New Hampshire is also surrounded by states that have motorcycle helmet laws, but they believe in "the wind in your hair." So my sister is a widow.

Maybe they should change their motto to "Live Free and Die." Makes it sort of embarrassing to be a libertarian. Individual liberty isn't about intentionally being stupid. It's about being smart by your own free choice, rather than because someone is going to send you to jail to protect you from yourself.

But public smoking is a special case. A basic premise of libertarianism is that no one has the right to initiate the use of force or violence. How can someone blowing poison gas in my face not be considered initiating violence?

Peter.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: JeremyC
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 11:28 AM

A smoking ban just passed recently here in Ohio, and I can definitely say it's hurt business at the bar I go to most often. It's definitely better for singers (even though I smoke, myself, I can tell the difference in my voice now that I'm not in secondhand smoke all the time, though as a smoker I hate to say it).

I do think the drunks in bars are more of a problem than the smokers. Sounds like the same thing exists in the UK, really--a friend of mine who works at the Waterstones in Winchester told me that, when they had their Harry Potter release party, people from the pubs kept coming in and causing trouble, even though the customers were mostly children who had been allowed to stay up past their bedtime to get a book and a bag of sweets and chosen for a Hogwarts house. Not that I think much of Harry Potter, but these were kids holding their mother's hands, and they didn't deserve to have their evening disrupted by loud, rude, foul-mouthed drunks fresh from a night at the pub. A person is much more likely to get into a fight or cause trouble after drinking than they are after smoking, not that I have a problem with either in moderation.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Bill D
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 11:34 AM

The attempt to shift the focus of the issue from the health and comfort of people in general and onto the 'poor, innocent folks who just like a cigarette with their beer, and the forlorn pub owners who can't cope' is just a red herring. There is no doubt that smoking kills and causes health problems for those it doesn't kill immediately....if it were invented today, it would never be approved. and it is only a matter of time before it is banned...maybe many years, but someday....The only reason it isn't now is to avoid the economic impact and the chaos of millions of hard-core smokers having fits and causing uproar.

   Someone needs to ASK all those smokers where they go now, and where they smoke. Are they JUST staying home? Are they going to pubs which do have a place outside to smoke? No matter what the answers, things WILL sort out. Some pubs may close...but listing individual examples shows nothing.....some pubs will survive, and do well. Some smokers will quit...some will just go where they can easily nip OUT for a smoke.

25 years ago, our local sing had ashtrays set out and some of us suffered...now smoking is banned and I only know 2 of the regulars who smoke, and they seem to cope. IT IS PROGRESS ...and it is GOOD progress.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Mr Happy
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 12:02 PM

Evert time the govt. makes up a new law, there's always a windfall in the offing for someone.

This time its builders, shelter manufacturers, others?

Ye know wot they say - Every cloud has a silver lining!

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Ebbie
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 12:49 PM

Way above in my last post a figure disappeared. I meant to say "In Alaska, it's (smoking regulation) within 10 feet of the door of a public building."

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: GUEST,Jim Carroll
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 02:59 PM

Swings and roundabouts,
Irish pubs did lose some customers because of the ban, but eventually those who didn't come before hand started to do so once they realised it was possible to breathe in pubs.
The two major factors now are the clampdown on drink-driving and the fact that publicans can sell their licences for astronomical amounts to anywhere in the country.
Jim Carroll
PS As far as I'm concerned smokers would be welcome anywhere if they didn't kill people and if they didn't smell.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: MBSLynne
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 04:19 PM

Pubs have been closing rather a lot in recent years, long before the smoking ban. It has become more and more difficult to make a living from just running a pub, particularly in villages. Our village used to have six and we now have three. And look at the number of pubs that are now Indian restaurants. There are all sorts of reasons for it, including the fact that people tend to go out to pubs in their cars and drink less than they did a few years ago. I think the smoking ban is just one of many factors.

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Big Phil
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 05:10 PM

It would have been much easier just to let the Landlord decide on the smoking debacle. Either he wants a smoking pub, or he wants a non smoking pub, the smokers and non smokers can then decide on which type of pub to visit.

But I forgot, that would have been too easy to leave it to the individual to make his/her mindup, better the nanny state to tell us what to do. I am a nonsmoker, but would still visit a smoking pub, its down to individual choice, or it should be.

If smoking is such a threat to all our lives, why not ban it, end of story, oh I forgot the Government takes hundreds of millions in tax off the smokers, what a shower of double standard b@st@rds they are.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 05:15 PM

At last, some common sense!
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Grab
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 05:18 PM

Beg pardon, I've looked up about Wetherspoons and I'm completely wrong. I must just have been lucky in only being near no-smoking Wetherspoonses!

Link interestingly *does* say that their profits went down a lot (20%) with no smoking - but does also quote a director saying "There is no doubt we have lost smokers to pubs next door. That can't happen, of course, under a universal ban." It also says that food sales went up by 10%.

href=http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1723302,00.html

I'm prepared to believe that before the ban came in, the hardcore drinkers would head for a smoking pub over a no-smoking pub, and Wetherspoons does have a "drink-till-you-drop" kind of customer base. After the ban - well, instead of going to pub A or pub B, it's a choice between going out or not going out. If your time down the pub is important to you, then we're not talking an effect, are we?

For examples of smoke-free drinking, check out Scotland and Ireland. I don't believe banning smoking killed the pubs in either of those countries.

Graham.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 05:21 PM

I know I said I wouldn't argue with skipy anymore - I'm not! Big Phil, you say It would have been much easier just to let the Landlord decide on the smoking debacle. They HAVE had exactly that choice since Walter R brought the weed into this country. They decided that they couldn't be arsed to spend any money cleaning up the air. They would rather make money than help people live. There are 30 pubs near me. NOT A SINGLE ONE WAS NO SMOKING. Sorry to shout but there was not one pub I could go in without setting off an asthma attack. Is that fair? It is precisely because pubs did NOT offer the choice that the legislation had been brought in. No ifs buts (pun intended) or excuses. The pubs have brought this on themselves.

Dave.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 05:24 PM

Tough!

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 04:13 AM

For examples of smoke-free drinking, check out Scotland and Ireland. I don't believe banning smoking killed the pubs in either of those countries.

Grab, use Google.
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 05:40 AM

I agree - Grab. Use Google. Check out the following sites for their views.

This one from Money week is pretty impartial.

A quick search though the ASH web site will, not surprisingly, yield you more links to landlords supporting the ban than there are ones against. (NB - This site contains Flash content and may not let you link back - Open it in a seperate window!)

A little bit more surprising is the support it has received from the most sucessful consumer organisation in the world - CAMRA

Finaly, one I would never rely on just on it's own but there are many links to follow. An article in Wikipedia about bans makes some very interesting points about the effects on the licensed trade that seems to deny what is being banded about here.

Happy reading:-)

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:00 AM

Try   http://www.davehitt.com/facts/banlinks.html
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Ernest
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:51 AM

So pubs frequented mostly by smokers close down because the smokers themselves don`t go there anymore?

Looks like it is the smokers fault then.

They chose to give up one habit (going to the pub) instead of the other (smoking) which they were asked to stop only temporarily (while inside the premises).

I pity them (seriously).
Ernest

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Mr Red
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 08:02 AM

So the warning that some marginal pubs would be weeded out

was that a filter tip?

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 08:03 AM

In March 2007 CAMRA reported 56 closures a month.

http://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/news_detail.aspx?articleid=28654

so there would have to be an increase on that for the smoking ban to have had an effect.

Many morris teams and folkies will have stories of pubs refusing business.

Here's mine - I rang up a pub landlady and said we were thinking of dancing outside the pub - with a group of others - total about 40 extra people. I thought I would be helping the pub to cope. "There's be glasses to wash, you'll be wanting drinks, etc etc....".

We went elsewhere.......

Thought for a thread.......

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 08:07 AM

So far we have opinions from Money Week - A well established and respected financial magazine. ASH - The UK anti-smoking lobby with the support of the Government and the Medical Profession. CAMRA - the most sucessful consumer organisation in history and Wikipedia - The starting point for so many internet enquiries.

Versus...

Dave 'the Hitman' Hitt. Who has come out with the classic line of reasoning "nobody can give me three names of individuals killed by passive smoking. Therefore nobody has been killed by passive smoking".

Hmmmm. Wonder who I believe?

I have told you skipy - I am not arguing with you any more. Your reasoning appears to have gone out of the window. Feel free to keep quoting landlords who cannot run pubs and wannabee comedians who not many people find funny to your hearts content.

I will not ignore them altogether. Just try to give another side of the coin. Assume for one minute that every smoker is against the ban and every non smoker is for it (not true I know but the best we have) then for every 34 articles you link to I will have access to 66. Odds of nearly 2 to 1 against. Fancy a bet as to who can find most? :-)

Cheers

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 08:33 AM

comedians who not many people find funny to your hearts content.
?????
You lost me at that point Dave.
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 08:35 AM

Dave Hitt. He IS joking. Isn't he?

:D

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 08:59 AM

Sorry mate, I don't know who he is.
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 09:31 AM

ummm...skipy...Dave Hitt is the guy whose site YOU linked to above.

and his site is full of bad arguments for 'freedom'.

Smoking is a VERY hard to break habit, and many smokers are trapped in the circular reasoning of "I can't, or don't wish to stop, therefore any semi-logic that supports MY wishes sounds good".

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Big Mick
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 09:44 AM

What idiotic logic this is. Personally I could care less if you smoke. You have every right to destroy your own body and die a horrible, long drawn out death. So long as you do that in a way that doesn't interfere with my right not to smoke, or be exposed to a toxic substance against my will, please knock yerself out. You have no right to force me to partake in your habit under any circumstances.

We are seeing a lot of this in the States as well. I guess I would have done it differently. I would allow any business that wants to cater to smokers to do so. But it would be exclusively. I would make them put very noticable signage up that indicates it is a smoking establishment. I would not allow non smoking sections. An establishment would be assumed to be non smoking unless it had size mandated signage to the contrary. This way the market would take care of the problem. Non smokers would have a choice as to whether they wanted to go to the smoking places. The only other thing I would do would be to ban smoking in all public places. This would stop me having to walk through the filthy smoke at doors to non smoking places.

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 09:57 AM

That would be perfect for me as well, Mick. Did you see the link to Wiki? If you follow this one and look for 'effects on business' it shows a smoking 'room' in Tokyo - Smoking is prohibited on streets in some areas of Tokyo, hence smokers retreat into smoking lounges.. What a wonderful idea!

I agree wholeheartedly with your earlier logic as well.

Cheers

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 10:08 AM

At last we all agree, now lets get it implemented!
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 10:11 AM

I'd support it - As long as you stop trying to convince us that banning smoking in public places is a bad thing! Have we found common ground. This is indeed the dawn of a new era:-)

Cheers

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Jeri
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 10:14 AM

Mick, if some establishments catered to smokers, an employee must be willing to expose him/herself to second hand smoke. Employees could be discriminated against if they were unwilling or incapable of working in a toxic environment. In the US, they'd holler at (Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). In the UK, there's probably a similar organization.

A private club could get away with it, but I don't know if an establishment open to the general public could.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 10:22 AM

It looks like, from what I can see, the smoking lounges in Tokyo are not manned. I am only hazzarding a guess but if the standard refuse collection personel, supplied with appropriate hazardous materials protection (particulate masks, gloves, overalls), kept them clean it would not be an issue?

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 10:52 AM

"...allow any business that wants to cater to smokers to do so. "

And delivery men? And guys who repair things like plumbing & refrigeration units? And building inspectors? etc.... ALL these people have go into most commercial buildings, often for extended periods.

It is much more complicated than just 'allowing smokers to damage themselves if they wish'.

There are many laws to protect the public from their own stupidity in other areas; regarding drugs they are allowed access to; places and speeds they are allowed to drive; even the amount of 'noise' in workplaces without protection.

It took many years for research to prove that smoking, including 2nd hand smoke, was harmful as well as 'unpleasant' for many of us, and now that there is almost universal acceptance of the health problems of tobacco, people need to quit fighting the efforts to reduce PUBLIC restriction while we work on a gradual total ban!

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 11:17 AM

Dave! I've never said that & wouldn't. I'm all for segregated venues with the landlord / owner choosing. Always have been & always will be.
We stopped smoking in work here about 8 years ago & guess who brought that in, yep, yours truly.
We have 2 smoking sheds here & the no smokers often sit in them with us, but there has been quite a bit of bad feeling about that over the last couple of weeks from a few individuals.
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Big Mick
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 12:00 PM

I believe that those problems could be overcome very simply by requiring delivery areas that are non smoking, and segregated. It would impose an additional financial burden on the business, hence increased costs for the customer, but if they are committed to their right to smoke, then they should be willing to pay it. Also, as to the issue of employees, the same rules would apply. Those that did not want to work in smoking clubs (after all, it is primarily clubs, restaraunts, pubs, and bars we are speaking of here) would simply not go there. I know, as a performer, that I have refused to play pubs without adequate ventilation. The point isn't that I am protecting smokers rights. Society doesn't seem ready to outlaw this horrible product as it should, preferring to let the market place resolve the problem, as well as peer pressure. If one is not willing to bite the bullet and outlaw this killer, then regulating its harmful effects is in order. Some feel the need to impose their values on smokers. Personally, and as an ex smoker, I don't care what they do TO THEMSELVES. If smokers are not willing to quit, that is their business, providing they don't impose their filthy habit on me. This would provide a way for them to exercise their poor judgement without imposing on the rest of us. If employers couldn't get enough customers, or employees, or performers, they would cease to exist.

I just don't believe in allowing anything that imposes others smoke on me against my will. In the abstract, I don't care if they choose to expose themselves to this poison of their own free will, just keep it away from me.

It is doable,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: GUEST,happy ex pat
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 12:25 PM

What the hell is wrong with us brits,we cant drink in moderation,we would rather smoke knowing the dangers instead of socialising respectably.We look like uncivilised gits and behave like complete meat heads.In spain i look at us and wonder where it has all gone wrong and can we ever become a civilised nation,instead of the cast of Jerry Springer,the musical.Yes,i know they smoke in bars in spain,but i can sit outside in warm comfort amongst people who act responsibly and look much more civilised,god help you all.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: kendall
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 03:35 PM

I got cancer from smoking, not from driving a car.

Maybe there are just too many pubs?

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 03:37 PM

Too many pubs?? Kendall.... go wash your mouth out!!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Ernest
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 03:54 PM

Big Mick.
if you become the ruler, please grant me the sole right to sell those signs that would indicate the businesses catering smokers.

I will be damned rich because every single business would simply buy a sign and go on as before.

Thinking of it "Smokewhiner`s" would be a great name for my business...

;0)

Sincerely: this is a field where the market doesn`t work (as someone has pointed out before: it had the chance since the time tobacco was brought to Europe. Apparently publicians are to timid to try). Nothing especially wrong with that: every market needs its regulations to work properly - otherwise trusts would take over and establish a monopol

Regards
Ernest

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 04:33 PM

I take it you'd be OK to smoke anything you wanted in these places...

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 06:16 PM

I really don't know where you are coming from skipy. You say you support the ban on smoking in public places yet you are campaigning for allowing smoking in pubs. What are pubs if they are not public places? Give us a consistant argument if nothing else.

Cheers

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 06:35 PM

I have neighbors (thirty-something) who are smokers but can't kick the habit. They only smoke on their front porch, in the hope that they will smoke less and their house will be cleaner.

It's really something to see them on the porch when it bitterly cold or wretchedly hot out, but that's how they cope.

Not all smokers are in favor of smoking.

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Big Mick
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 06:42 PM

Ernest, I can't speak for the UK, but I don't believe that is the case in the US. Remember that the smoke/non smoke, under my way of doing things is not optional. You may not do both. You are either a smoking establishment or a non smoking establishment. Assuming your predicate is true, and I don't believe it is, then the smoking ban shouldn't last long, because the majority of your voters will rise up against it and agitate to do away with the ban. Wait .. you mean there is no strong popular movement against??????? Must be a vast left wing conspiracy to hold down all the folks that like to smoke ........ he says with tongue firmly planted in cheek. Despite all the predictions in Ireland, the US cities that have enacted, and the UK, that the people would never stand for this, there has been no mass uprising. I believe the polls show that most folks support this, and the support is growing daily. Remember the things that truly change these habits. For one, when the taxes on cigarettes here in the States went up, there was a corresponding drop in usage. Doing as I have suggested would create another drop as folks that decide against patronizing smoking joints seek other places.

Outright prohibition rarely really works, as the US experiment on the alchohol front has shown. But smart legislation/taxation/litigation can be very effective in in raising price and thus deterring the habit until the amount of smokers is so small that one could do away with the nasty buggers. Done right, it doesn't infringe on personal rights in the same way that bans do.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 06:43 PM

I really don't know where you are coming from skipy
& I don't know why you consistantly fail to comprehend my stance!
A ban on smoking in public places that are designated no smoking by the owner / landlord .............no problem, no problem at all.
The right of an owner / landord to choose is what I want.
If owner feels that his buisness will do better non smoking then so be it.
If he / she feels they would rather have smokers then so be it.
But the right to choose, that is what is important here.
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Alice
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:02 PM

You get some interesting results if you google "ethics of smoking ban".

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Ebbie
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:11 PM

I read a first person account once of a man who had smoked for years, had tried unsuccessfully for years to quit and was finally diagnosed with lung cancer.

And, he said, The saddest thing to discover was how easy it was to quit when it was too late.

(Just a little grist for the mill)

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:16 PM

You certainly do! & a lot of them echo what I am saying!
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:49 PM

One person's right to choose is always liable to mean the denial of choice to some other person, and this is no exception. The right to choose of the landloard isn't what concerns me. My right to choose does concern me. And my choice is to have the pubs I like to drink in free from tobacco smoke.

I agree that I'd prefer there to have been some loopholes to allow for places that were primarily smoking venues, such as Shisha bars. But in a society where a large majority of people do not smoke and prefer non-smoking environments public houses, which should be accessible to everyone, are rightly smoke free

Subject: RE: BS: Smoking ban closing pubs, it's started!
From: Alice
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:53 PM

Click here