Public smoking ban! What do you want?

Thats not fair, Smokers are not renowned for anything apart from bad breath and yellow teeth.

Smoking is BAD, i smoke, its bad.

But its no good the way they want free enterprise when it comes to schools and hospitals, but when it comes to the market sorting it out with smoking, the nanny state takes over, why not just have smoking pubs and non smoking pubs, why force people to behave in ways they are not inclined to, if the market is there pubs and restraunts will ban smoking, im sure some already have. Nobody requires you to go to a pub or a cafe where people can smoke. If a person hates smoking, dont work in a bar.
Surely personal choice should govern such things.

[Lordmagic]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

Diversion tactics, ducking diving. Trying to divert blame. Dentists now. Smokers are renowned for it.

Not at all sweetpea, I openly admit it kills people 'sometimes' but so does lots of other things and thats life. Drinking alchohol causes liver disease but that would cause uproar wouldnt it, sorry to bring George Best into this but he's a prime example of this.

Hospital beds... well thats not the fault of the smoker really is it? Maybe it's due to unsufficient funding for the NHS hence the recent proposal of closing half of Burnley General Hospital which INCLUDES the A&E which could be moved as far as Blackburn, now I suppose smokers are to blame there or is it FUNDING??? Like I previously stated, I work and pay in so that entitles me to get out (if needed) like those that dont contribute anything and still manage to buy ciggies. Smoking is dirty, smelly, distgusting, expensive to smoke and expensive to the tax payer there's no denying that but where is the fairness? and who's representing the smoker? Oneway street as it seems and thats not democracy.

[Sweetpea]

I like a drink, but it's not killing anyone else, especially as I do not drive.

The hospital bed situation, is the hospital bed situation. Guess who fills most of them.

The hospital bed situation, is the hospital bed situation. Guess who fills most of them.

Working class people i expect, the rich go private or abroad.
But working class people, eat worse, smoke more, drink more, work harder in crappier jobs, many for long hours, there kids go to crappy schools, that prepare them for a life much like or sometimes worse than their parents.

Its hardly a suprise they fill the beds, but i bet they also pay a greater portion of their money in taxes, with NI, Income tax, tax on beer tax on fags, tax on petrol, tax on everything.

[Sweetpea]

This has come down to nothing but a tax argument. Prevarication.

Smoking related disease is the biggest killer in this country. But it does not just take down the smoker.

[Col.Kurtz]

Might as well have us smokers sew a health warning on our sleeve.

[Sweetpea]

Well!

[Col.Kurtz]

Originally Posted by Madog

Working class people i expect, the rich go private or abroad.
But working class people, eat worse, smoke more, drink more, work harder in crappier jobs, many for long hours, there kids go to crappy schools, that prepare them for a life much like or sometimes worse than their parents.

Its hardly a suprise they fill the beds, but i bet they also pay a greater portion of their money in taxes, with NI, Income tax, tax on beer tax on fags, tax on petrol, tax on everything.

Go Madog go Madog!!

I dont agree that this is a tax related argument.

For me its more a matter of liberty, at the moment i am at liberty to smoke in any pub that will allow me to. If they where to say no, dont smoke in here, i wouldnt complain, i might take my business somewhere else though.

You too are at liberty not to frequent establishments that allow smoking.
I am glad you cant smoke in the pictures anymore, i can last without a fag for the length of a film. Nobody had to force cinemas to do this, most did it because nicotine discolours the screen, plus cinemas are really for family entertainment. Pubs on the otherhand are for adults usually, i dont mind if some go non smoking, i may even eat in them and have a smoke outside.
But i dislike the element of enforcment that is being proposed. Its not just me, some landlords want to smoke in their own pubs, and if its your pub, why shouldnt you?

To take another tack, i am not at liberty to ignore the smoke people create with cars, nor do i make any myself. I cant choose not to go out of my house. I wouldnt bother to advocate that nobody should drive, its unrealistic. Picking on smokers is just a diversion in itself.

Picking on smokers will not stop many children from contracting asthma.

[Lordmagic]

Sorry for the delay, I just had a fag in my own home waiting for some little kiddies to knock at my door trick or treating so all the tobacco smoke can woof out all over them.

Everybody has a choice. If you smoke respect no smoking areas. If you dont smoke, start you'll enjoy it whith added bennefits of the NHS in later life.

[Sweetpea]

Of course you have a choice. You do, however, have no right to force that choice on me or people like me.

I am asthmatic. Something I blame on my parents smoking.

If i owned a pub, id definitly want to smoke behind my own bar, id be militant about it, id burn ciggarettes in holders like incense, and require that all my staff share my filthy habit, it would be my pub, and my choice.

I mean, fair enough if you work in a warehouse or a big plant or office or mill or factory, you can ban smoking in the workplace there, but in a pub, or in a one man band of any kind its different.

I wouldnt work with any plumber who doesnt smoke, id feel bad inflicting my smoke on them. But to expect a small employer not to smoke at work defeats one of the main raesons for being self employeed or working in a small workshop, or a pub ie the libetry to smoke, have a laugh, lark about a bit.

What we need is more liberty and a good dose of common sense.

I dont want to inflict my filthy habit on anyone, but if it was my pub, and i say smoking is fine, why do you get to say it isnt?

You wouldnt after all have to come in, and if you are indeed asthmatic i wouldnt advise it, id advise you to go to the non smoking pub and leave my pub for all the yellow fingered ferret keeping types and their wheezing lurchers.

Surely there are pubs you can go to that have a non smoking policy?

I dont go the pub that often, so i honestly dont know what the score is round here. If there is no non smoking pub, then there should be.

[Sweetpea]

To limit the places that one human being can inflict a toxic sustance on another, is common sense.

If you owned a pub, you would have a legal duty of care towards your barstaff. I suspect you would lose your pub.

Thats my point entirly, i dont want to employ someone who doesnt smoke, even if that is non-smokerist, i dont care, most of my old work mates in the building trade smoke like billyo, and thats fine, we all smoke, we dont complain, we just get on with our work.

If i own a pub i can refuse to serve people if i choose, they can refuse to come in, nobody is forcing anyone to do anything at present.

You dont have to go to a pub like you might have to go to the tax office, or to post office.

Its all a matter of choice, i choose to smoke, i dont inflict it on anyone whoi is that unwilling, if they really hated it that much they wouldnt be there