OllyK

It was interesting to hear on the news this morning that following the public smoking ban in California (7 years ago), tabacco sales fell initially but are now at an all time high. Looks like that plan worked well, so well in fact we plan to follow suit

Mr Sympathy

Unfortunately smokers contribute so much tax that only 12.5% is used to treat smoking related illness in the NHS, at the moment they prop up the NHS so any bans have to be slow to redirect the tax somewhere else into the economy, probably through motoring.

If you want a reason to stop smoking speak to your local heart surgeon and go and see them operate on f***ed up hearts and lungs after years of smoking.

BTW me? lifelong non smoker, hate it roll on the complete bans, remember smokers have the equivalent of an extra two weeks off work a year with even modest cigarett breaks let alone sick time due to ill health.

Mice_Elf

From listening to the head of Weatherspoons on the radio this morning, this will only initially impact 60 of their 650 pubs. These 60 will be smoke-free by May, apparently.

mj

a better solution would be to have designated smoking and non smoking areas, and decent ventilation throughout.

everybody's happy

TelBoy

Have we reached the point where somebody mentions that Government income from cigarettes exceeds NHS treatment costs? I always enjoy that bit.

OllyK

You've missed it, scroll up about 4 or 5 posts

kpnuts

My rant, People who smoke stink, they spread the stink around them, on their clothes and in the air, I like a couple of pints at the weekend, I walk to the pub, People are smoking in there but I am not going to let their habbit spoil my time why should I think however I think there should be a smoking and non smoking area, the problem Is keeping the areas sepperate from an air point of view surely in this day and age that should be possible, I do not like to see the nanny state banning everything including smoking even though I hate the habbit,

Aztec Performance Ltd

iTrader: (234)

Dont really see your point (if there is one?).

If people want to cause themselves harm by smoking then so be it. Its their choice (+ any influence from the nasty addictive poisons added to tabbaco to make it more addictive.....the massive marketing spends by tabacco companies etc etc).

Smokers do not however have the right to spread the ill effects of their dirty, diesease ridden habits upon others (ie secondary smoke and stink etc).

It is only a matter of time before a full ban in all public spaces and in my opinion it couldnt come too soon.

Bob

TelBoy

Damn

Smoking threads always induce a mild form of myopia, can't think why.

OllyK

My point is that the smoking ban in California has resulted in an increase in smoking.

Deaths attributed to passive smoking are minimal. Get to the heart of the issue - public health - and produce legislation that has the biggest impact on improving public health, the full time smokers, or don't bother. The government won't do that as they can't afford to (financially), so we have crap legislation to win votes but avoid actually addressing the problem.

It's a bit like trying to reduce road deaths with speed cameras, 10 years on and it's not working. 10 years on, as many or more people will be dying from smoking related disease as they do today. Passive smoking is not the issue. Look at the bigger picture. Ban it outright, make it a class B drug or leave it as it is, but don't piddle about trying to make people think you are improving things without actually achieving anything

Freak

Having just returned from new york i can say this cant happen quickly enough over here

Concierge at the hotel said i would always be able to find a bar club or restaurant in the city because there would be a few people crowded round the entrance smoking.
It certainly didnt seem to affect any bars trade over there- its a blanket law, and has been accepted. Now if they implement it here properly it will be great

Its fantastic- and the first night i went back to work after returning, i hated coming home with my clothes my hair and my records absolutely reeking of smoke

At least wetherspoons are leading the way- just need this P.O.S gvt. to get off their *** and make it everywhere.

agree with ollyk above too- needs to be decided one way or the other

Aztec Performance Ltd

iTrader: (234)

To be quite blunt mate....I doesnt directly effect me how many smokers die etc. Its their choice.

What does effect me is the secondary smoke (irratates my eyes and throat, makes my clothes and hair stink etc).

Therefore a smoking ban in public places is welcomed by me and resolves any issues I have with it.

I know the facts and choose not to smoke:

"Smoking KILLS

Every year hundreds of thousands of people around the world die from diseases caused by smoking.

One in two lifetime smokers will die from their habit. Half of these deaths will occur in middle age.

Cigarettes are full of chemicals and poisons. As you discovered in our chemicals in cigarettes section tobacco smoke contains over 4,000 chemicals.

Tobacco smoke also contributes to a number of cancers.

The mixture of nicotine and carbon monoxide in each cigarette you smoke temporarily increases your heart rate and blood pressure, straining your heart and blood vessels.

This can cause heart attacks and stroke. It slows your blood flow, cutting off oxygen to your feet and hands.Some smokers end up having their limbs
amputated.

Tar coats your lungs like soot in a chimney and causes cancer. A 20-a-day smoker breathes in up to a full cup (210 g) of tar in a year.

Changing to low-tar cigarettes does not help because smokers usually take deeper puffs and hold the smoke in for longer, dragging the tar deeper into their lungs.

Carbon monoxide robs your muscles, brain and body tissue of oxygen, making your whole body and especially your heart work harder. Over time, your airways swell up and let less air into your lungs.

Smoking causes disease and is a slow way to die. The strain put on your body by smoking often causes years of suffering. Emphysema is an illness that slowly rots your lungs. People with emphysema often get bronchitis again and again, and suffer lung and heart failure.

Lung cancer from smoking is caused by the tar in tobacco smoke. Men who smoke are ten times more likely to die from lung cancer than non-smokers.

Heart disease and strokes are also more common among smokers than non-smokers.

Smoking causes fat deposits to narrow and block blood vessels which leads to heart attack.

Smoking causes around one in five deaths from heart disease.

In younger people, three out of four deaths from heart disease are due to smoking."


Make your own informed decision....just dont force the ill effects upon non-smokers also.

Bob

MattW

My father was a 30+ a day smoker all his life (bar the first 15 years) he had a heart attack at 49, told to give up. He had another at 56, and a week later whilst in hospital he had another which killed him.

He outlived his grandmother by 5 years (101), his father by 3 years (79), his mother outlived him by 2 years (83).

He left one grandchild who isn't old enough to remember him, since his death he's had another who can only look at the pictures of him. He left a daughter who is yet to marry, so won't have her father there to walk her down the aisle.

The cause, smoking without doubt.

I hate the fact that when I come home from the pub my clothes stink, my jacket reeks. However I wouldn't want to see it banned, some decent complsery ventilation would do the trick.

OllyK

...as it yours to go in to an environment that you know will be smokey. Nobody is holding a gun to your head and forcing you in to that pub. If you go, you go with your eyes open (as you have shown, you are well aware of the effects / risks), so either you are not that bothered or the wish to drink a beer in public out weighs your health concerns.

If all these people cheering for a ban, don't ever go to pubs because of the smoke I'd be a little more sympathetic, the thing is they do go, despite knowing the consequences and choose to blame somebody else for it. What's next? Better ban beer in the pubs as some people get drunk and start fights? Ban fruit machines as it promotes gambling? Ban duke boxes as they more often than not are full of crap boy band music?

It all about choices and you are saying you should have the right to do something you can't (easily) do at the moment at the expense of somebody else's right to do something they have been doing for years. So what happens when somebody decides their right to do something is more important than something you hold dear? Do you roll over and take it?

I'm a non-smoker but at the end of the day it is legal to smoke tobacco and while it is legal people should be able to smoke in pubs. It would be nice if they had a separate room for the smokers sure, but they should be able to smoke non the less. If I go to the pub for a drink, then I accept there will be people there smoking.

sillysi

I work at a Brewery and we have a few houses who are trying a complete smoking ban. So far "wet" sales have gone up. The regulars who smoke seem to drink more to compensate for lack of cigs.

M444GY

iTrader: (72)

dont think its a good idea . my local has a very large no smoking section and it works fine the way it is . they will lose alot of trade when the ban comes in imho

Freak

I have little choice of the air in my working environment- at the moment i accept it as part of the job, but new york was, and i mean this literally, a breath of fresh air.

TheBigMan

A pub is a public place. Hence public house.

The only errosion of rights and choices would come by NOT enforcing a ban. Smoking in a pub affects all, smoking at home only affects those who smoke (maybe family to).

You're saying "why should smokers be forced not to smoke in a pub". Others are saying "why should non smokers be forced to breathe in somebody elses smoke".

Something that concerns me is that you feel that a pub is somewhere that should encourage smoking, like the smoker has a god given right to smoke 'cos its a pub'. As soon as someone elses actions affect my livelihood it becomes my problem - government aren't going to ban smoking, the loss from taxes coupled with the rants of "dictatorship" prevent any such action.

Their proposals are a compromise - allow smokers to smoke as long as it affects nobody else. This I am in 100% agreement with and is long over due.

Buckrogers

Jerome, I thought smoking is banned in all public places, inside?

Buck

Dracoro

As for this argument that pubs will lose trade if there's a ban, well that's ridiculous. Are you seriously suggesting that people place having a smoke above having a beer and a social life?

People who don't visit coz of smoke will
Smokers will still go to the pub (and disappear aver 1/2 hour for a fix, although many may just give up)
Non-smokers that currently go to the pub will continue to do so and be free from smoke, smells, passive smoking etc.

Is there anyone here who HONESTLY will stop going to pubs if there's a smoking ban in pubs?

Buckrogers

Name one person and provide proof.

Abdabz

Ahhhh the black knight must have been a smoker then!!!

http://www.intriguing.com/mp/_pictur...lyGrail021.jpg

P

dharbige

What a dumb argument. It's legal for me to sing loudly out of tune, but if I go to the local pub (not on karaoke evening, obviously), and start wailing through "I Should Be So Lucky" at the top of my voice, I'd probably be asked to leave. Why? It's not illegal to sing.

BECAUSE IT WILL INTERFERE WITH THE ENJOYMENT OF OTHER CUSTOMERS!

TheBigMan

OllyK is supporting a selfish stance that is a concensus of most smokers.

Your point (IN CAPITALS) is pretty much all that needs to be said on this point. Anyone with any common sense will agree.

TheBigMan

Do you mind if I smoke??

Not at all, do you mind if I fart in your face??

Dracoro

Exactly

Farting is legal too so I'm sure OllyK would be ok if I continuously farted in his face while he drinks/eats etc.

TheBigMan

Well it IS a pub - farting is almost expected.

Abdabz

LOL - sit in the no smoking section of a well ventilated pub and stop moaning.

They'll be banning dry ice machines next coz thats a bit annoying.

Ahh and people with lisps - spitting everywhere - yeah lets ban that too...

TheBigMan

Ahhh, the impartial opinion of a selfish smoker.

You give the smokers that don't want to be held responsible for non smokers' health/smell a bad name!!

StickyMicky

ban the *******s

enough said from me
my girlfriend smokes a little when she goes out drinking and stuff, i tend to stay away, i hate it, my staff smoke, i hate it, i cleaned the office walls with TFR and you should have seen the nicotene run down the walls even one of the smoker staff got a shock

smokers are selfish arseholes IMO
unless they smoke away from other nonsmokers (unlikely)

sum stinking old woman came in for a car wash, paid the lad while puffing away her last few drags, then dropped the ****en dumper on the prewash pad right in front of me does she not ****en relise that sumbody has to clean that **** up :mad

i felt like putting the thing back in her car at the end of the wash