I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
To be fair that is different to saying we should do a fiscal analysis to decide, but not include the real costs if they are distasteful.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Anyone remember those cigarette sweets you could buy in the 70s and 80s?
Wonder whatever happened to them? 😂
And 50s and 60s. White sugary sticks painted red on the end. sold in packs of 10. I was a fan. At the age of about 7 it was the height of cool in 1962.
The sugary tobacco was nicest, coconut based I think. Came in a packet like your granda's Condor pipe tobacco.
In local Council by-election news, I was amused to read in Andrew Teale's previews that the Green candidate today in Vauxhall, which includes the MI6 building, is none other than J. Bond.
J for Jacqueline in this case, although there has been some speculation about a female Bond post-Daniel Craig.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Who is this they? And is playing rugby actually life shortening vs the average Brit? Probably depends if the fifteen pints of lager and midnight curries are included.
After just 24 hours, the government has dropped its commitment to reopen the Leamside Line. It was included yesterday in the initial Network North announcements, now it’s gone.
Roads minister Richard Holden tells me Govt is now just ‘committed to looking into it’.
Furious reaction already. @henrimurison says this announcement makes the entirety of Network North a ‘fairytale’.
Worth noting that Henri Murison is CEO of Osborne's Northern Powerhouse Partnership. If he is describing NN as a fairytale, it matters.
And as I have been picking at for the last 24 hours, the rest of it is crayons as well. Unless @HYUFD can tell us exactly what the Manchester North West Quadrant scheme is which was greenlit yesterday?
I don't think that is dropping it to say they are looking into it.
Murison is clearly an ally of Osborne who was strongly supportive of HS2
A structural UK economic problem is they only have 1 rich city (London) and it has an extreme housing shortage
You could solve this by building more housing in London, connecting more areas to London, or spreading out growth (hard)—but ongoing UK policy is "none of the above"
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
Everybody has the right to go to hell their own way. The Pensionerism urge to constrain law-abiding citizens for their own good is disturbing, and far too popular on PB. Aaron Bastani was right...
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
Everybody has the right to go to hell their own way. The Pensionerism urge to constrain law-abiding citizens for their own good is disturbing, and far too popular on PB. Aaron Bastani was right...
A structural UK economic problem is they only have 1 rich city (London) and it has an extreme housing shortage
You could solve this by building more housing in London, connecting more areas to London, or spreading out growth (hard)—but ongoing UK policy is "none of the above"
The problem is also this has been a problem basically forever in modern times. Its totally ingrained into everything. Every graduate wants to move to London, every company wants their HQ in London (or very close to London), etc etc etc. Getting sent to Coventry, well Birmingham, is seen as you weren't good enough for a top job, in the way doing a vocational qualification is seen as well you obviously weren't bright enough to do A-Levels*.
* Just to be clear I am not saying this is what I believe, rather why we go through NVQ, GNVQ, T-Levels, whatever nonsense Rishi came up with over breakfast yesterday morning, etc.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
Bloody hell. So we could really be left with a total white elephant, for huge spend and none of the benefits.
Really happy to see the government take these long term decisions. I wonder if anyone in the cabinet is seriously uncomfortable with the decision?
The interesting thing about terminating at OOC is not that it's 5 miles west of the city centre. If you're going to, say, Oxford Circus, all other things being equal, it's probably much of a muchness between going via OOC or Euston. The problem is however that if everyone else gets off at OOC, the Elizabeth Line can't accommodate them all.
It's also a bloody nuisance for anyone trying to get on an Elizabeth Line train inbound of OOC, as the trains will be too full to board.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
These are good arguments. But I would also want to draw a distinction between those things which only harm you (cigarettes) and those things likely to harm others (drunk driving).
Perhaps seatbelts is a better comparison.
I was going to use the seatbelts argument as well but was too pissed off with the obnoxious dismissal of smokers having a “weakness”.
Smoking does harm others though, unborn children, children, people who might live with smokers who are inconsiderate but it also harms other people such as the families of smokers when the smokers are dying painfully from cancer and emphysema and they have to watch them go because they were hooked to a horrible addictive chemical. People are harmed by losing loved ones and friends.
If someone invented cigarettes today and said “these things will kill you, damage your health, stunt your baby’s growth. You will be addicted and spend a fortune on something really bad for you and society but they will act as a crutch when you are stressed ” they wouldn’t be allowed to sell them at all.
And to reconfirm I’m a smoker, not an evangelical ex smoker or someone who has never smoked so makes generalisations without the experience.
Its too performative for me. Tobacco is another vice, marketed and sold by bastards but we can legislate the advertising away.
Besides, vaping seems to be significantly reducing tobacco consumption amongst the young. Just let tobacco become an anachronism for the old and smelly with black powders muskets and classic cars. Let human nature do its thing.
I'm not entirely sold on the idea that vaping is harmless. There certainly seems to be some evidence it damages peoples' lungs, and vapes are getting into the hands of children (to whom they are clearly being targeted), and they are an unregulated product, containing an insanely addictive substance and perhaps a number of pathogens in many cases, whose long term health impact is largely unknown. If my kids started vaping I'd be pretty upset, maybe not as much as smoking but not far off.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
Bloody hell. So we could really be left with a total white elephant, for huge spend and none of the benefits.
Really happy to see the government take these long term decisions. I wonder if anyone in the cabinet is seriously uncomfortable with the decision?
I've made a few mentions of salting the earth based on the decision to sell the land at Euston (and elsewhere) that would be required to allow HS2 to be completed.
I wonder if Rishi has equally salted the long term popularity and reputation of the Tory party.
They've been carrying out work at Euston for HS2 for at least 5 years.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
To be fair that is different to saying we should do a fiscal analysis to decide, but not include the real costs if they are distasteful.
The job of the Government is not to maximise (income - spend). A fiscal analysis should never be where we stop; yet it appears to be where Luckyguy1983 stops.
I am generally on the side of liberalisation of drug policy so as to better regulate it so this flies in the face of that. I also have an inbuilt aversion to the concept of banning things, though can be persuaded otherwise.
However as an undoubtedly unhealthy activity that is in what appears to be terminal decline I understand the rationale in trying to hurry it along.
I think on balance I’d question the need for a ban. Smoking is becoming less and less popular as time goes on anyway, and the market will eventually treat it as a niche product and that will be it. At that point you can just make it so prohibitively expensive through general taxation (and lack of demand) that it will just become the preserve of the odd eccentric here or there. By actually prohibiting sale I think there is the risk that it becomes more exciting to youngsters as forbidden fruit, so as to make the whole thing counterproductive.
There are two main problems with banning tobacco outright.
The first is practical. Once it's illegal the government can do nothing to regulate supply and so ensure people get what they think they're buying. You might think you're buying tobacco, but there's no knowing what might be mixed up with it. If you're lucky it's nettle leaves, and if you're not it could be something worse for you than tobacco.
The second is more philosophical. I can't help but feel there is something very puritanical about the desire to ban mood-altering drugs. It's all dressed up in terms of cancer and addiction, but I think if a drug was discovered that simply made you feel happy, and had zero side-effects, you'd still have loads of people wanting it banned anyway. (Didn't they change the law in the UK so that was the case? Everything is banned by default, regardless of whether it's actually harmful, in a reversal of normal common law practice.)
Tobacco is, in my opinion, disgusting. It stinks, and it's awful for your health. I was delighted when it was banned from public transport and public buildings. But in a free society people are allowed to do things that are bad for them. If you cannot do things wrong then you aren't truly free.
And they won't stop with tobacco. They'll be after alcohol and sugar too, the joy-sucking fuckers.
I don't want to spend my retirement trying to buy black market sugar and worrying about its purity just so that I can bake some brownies.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
These are good arguments. But I would also want to draw a distinction between those things which only harm you (cigarettes) and those things likely to harm others (drunk driving).
Perhaps seatbelts is a better comparison.
I was going to use the seatbelts argument as well but was too pissed off with the obnoxious dismissal of smokers having a “weakness”.
Smoking does harm others though, unborn children, children, people who might live with smokers who are inconsiderate but it also harms other people such as the families of smokers when the smokers are dying painfully from cancer and emphysema and they have to watch them go because they were hooked to a horrible addictive chemical. People are harmed by losing loved ones and friends.
If someone invented cigarettes today and said “these things will kill you, damage your health, stunt your baby’s growth. You will be addicted and spend a fortune on something really bad for you and society but they will act as a crutch when you are stressed ” they wouldn’t be allowed to sell them at all.
And to reconfirm I’m a smoker, not an evangelical ex smoker or someone who has never smoked so makes generalisations without the experience.
Its too performative for me. Tobacco is another vice, marketed and sold by bastards but we can legislate the advertising away.
Besides, vaping seems to be significantly reducing tobacco consumption amongst the young. Just let tobacco become an anachronism for the old and smelly with black powders muskets and classic cars. Let human nature do its thing.
These disposable vapes are a tricky one. Otoh they can genuinely get you off fags. They're working for me (3 months and counting) when nothing else has. Otoh they leave you still hooked on nicotine (maybe more so because the tendency is to keep hitting on them every few minutes) and there's no doubt they are creating a whole new cohort of nicotine addicts, young people who have never smoked who go straight to sucking on these colourful tubes with flavours like 'mango and lime delight' and 'peanut bubblegum' and such like. It's ridiculous really. I guess they'll be banned soon. I'm dreading that personally but I couldn't argue with it.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
Everybody has the right to go to hell their own way. The Pensionerism urge to constrain law-abiding citizens for their own good is disturbing, and far too popular on PB. Aaron Bastani was right...
Bastani is becoming more and more centrist. Heartwarming to see.
He is getting old....or more that it is a canny business decision, now Corbyn project is dead in the water and he is starting to make appearances on the likes of GB News.
Interesting the Mirror has more Conservative readers than the Guardian and Independent now
Being slightly pedantic, that has been true for many years as the Mirror simply has a higher circulation.
I made the point earlier that it has long been the case that many more Lib Dem voters ready the Sun than the Indy, many more Labour voters read the Mail than the Guardian, and many more Tory voters read the Mirror than the FT.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Smoking is more addictive than rugby. People choose to play rugby. If someone plays rugby and wants to stop, they do. Most smokers want to quit. Most smokers have tried to quit. Smoking is mostly not done for pleasure; it is done out of addiction. Rugby players don’t play 40 matches a day to get their fix.
Tobacco companies have known this for many decades and have been manipulating nicotine amounts in cigarettes to maximise their return trade.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Smoking is more addictive than rugby. People choose to play rugby. If someone plays rugby and wants to stop, they do. Most smokers want to quit. Most smokers have tried to quit. Smoking is mostly not done for pleasure; it is done out of addiction. Rugby players don’t play 40 matches a day to get their fix.
Tobacco companies have known this for many decades and have been manipulating nicotine amounts in cigarettes to maximise their return trade.
This is the worst thing about current iteration of vapes. One "hit" might be lower nicotine than a traditional cigarette, but they are engineered so that you are able to and want to keep puffing on it continuously in way that isn't physically possible with cigarettes.
A structural UK economic problem is they only have 1 rich city (London) and it has an extreme housing shortage
You could solve this by building more housing in London, connecting more areas to London, or spreading out growth (hard)—but ongoing UK policy is "none of the above"
The problem is also this has been a problem basically forever in modern times. Its totally ingrained into everything. Every graduate wants to move to London, every company wants their HQ in London (or very close to London), etc etc etc. Getting sent to Coventry, well Birmingham, is seen as you weren't good enough for a top job, in the way doing a vocational qualification is seen as well you obviously weren't bright enough to do A-Levels*.
* Just to be clear I am not saying this is what I believe, rather why we go through NVQ, GNVQ, T-Levels, whatever nonsense Rishi came up with over breakfast yesterday morning, etc.
The house price differentials have gotten worse in modern times. The UK has been monopolar for several centuries, but the degree of the housing problem has changed.
Slightly weird twitter spat between Owen Jones and Martina Navratilova. Something to do with Enoch Powell.
You expect that little pip squeak Owen Jones to be on Twitter all day, every day getting into pointless arguments with people but slightly disappointed that the amazing Martina Navratilova would waste her time on him...
After just 24 hours, the government has dropped its commitment to reopen the Leamside Line. It was included yesterday in the initial Network North announcements, now it’s gone.
Roads minister Richard Holden tells me Govt is now just ‘committed to looking into it’.
Furious reaction already. @henrimurison says this announcement makes the entirety of Network North a ‘fairytale’.
Worth noting that Henri Murison is CEO of Osborne's Northern Powerhouse Partnership. If he is describing NN as a fairytale, it matters.
And as I have been picking at for the last 24 hours, the rest of it is crayons as well. Unless @HYUFD can tell us exactly what the Manchester North West Quadrant scheme is which was greenlit yesterday?
I don't think that is dropping it to say they are looking into it.
Murison is clearly an ally of Osborne who was strongly supportive of HS2
Its gone from - it will be opened to hmm if you are lucky....
Basically Rishi actually announced nothing yesterday because everything he did mention had so many caveats it will never happen - for instance Euston now reqires £5.5bn of private investment but no mention or idea where it will come from.
A bit more on Euston HS2. Building the station and tunnels from Old Oak Common now depends on private money, I understand. If there's no private sector investment then there's no Euston station and HS2's revised 8tph service will terminate at OOC.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
These are good arguments. But I would also want to draw a distinction between those things which only harm you (cigarettes) and those things likely to harm others (drunk driving).
Perhaps seatbelts is a better comparison.
I was going to use the seatbelts argument as well but was too pissed off with the obnoxious dismissal of smokers having a “weakness”.
Smoking does harm others though, unborn children, children, people who might live with smokers who are inconsiderate but it also harms other people such as the families of smokers when the smokers are dying painfully from cancer and emphysema and they have to watch them go because they were hooked to a horrible addictive chemical. People are harmed by losing loved ones and friends.
If someone invented cigarettes today and said “these things will kill you, damage your health, stunt your baby’s growth. You will be addicted and spend a fortune on something really bad for you and society but they will act as a crutch when you are stressed ” they wouldn’t be allowed to sell them at all.
And to reconfirm I’m a smoker, not an evangelical ex smoker or someone who has never smoked so makes generalisations without the experience.
Its too performative for me. Tobacco is another vice, marketed and sold by bastards but we can legislate the advertising away.
Besides, vaping seems to be significantly reducing tobacco consumption amongst the young. Just let tobacco become an anachronism for the old and smelly with black powders muskets and classic cars. Let human nature do its thing.
These disposable vapes are a tricky one. Otoh they can genuinely get you off fags. They're working for me (3 months and counting) when nothing else has. Otoh they leave you still hooked on nicotine (maybe more so because the tendency is to keep hitting on them every few minutes) and there's no doubt they are creating a whole new cohort of nicotine addicts, young people who have never smoked who go straight to sucking on these colourful tubes with flavours like 'mango and lime delight' and 'peanut bubblegum' and such like. It's ridiculous really. I guess they'll be banned soon. I'm dreading that personally but I couldn't argue with it.
Vaping was the only thing that worked to get me off cigarettes permanently. I would say as you have suggested I was probably more hopelessly addicted to nicotine while vaping than I ever was on cigarettes.
Now kicking the vaping - that was by far the biggest challenge. But it was doable. And yes it was a pretty rotten four-six weeks, but I got there. Moving the vape flavour to something sickly sweet and then replacing it with boiled sweets was the way I managed.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
These are good arguments. But I would also want to draw a distinction between those things which only harm you (cigarettes) and those things likely to harm others (drunk driving).
Perhaps seatbelts is a better comparison.
I was going to use the seatbelts argument as well but was too pissed off with the obnoxious dismissal of smokers having a “weakness”.
Smoking does harm others though, unborn children, children, people who might live with smokers who are inconsiderate but it also harms other people such as the families of smokers when the smokers are dying painfully from cancer and emphysema and they have to watch them go because they were hooked to a horrible addictive chemical. People are harmed by losing loved ones and friends.
If someone invented cigarettes today and said “these things will kill you, damage your health, stunt your baby’s growth. You will be addicted and spend a fortune on something really bad for you and society but they will act as a crutch when you are stressed ” they wouldn’t be allowed to sell them at all.
And to reconfirm I’m a smoker, not an evangelical ex smoker or someone who has never smoked so makes generalisations without the experience.
Its too performative for me. Tobacco is another vice, marketed and sold by bastards but we can legislate the advertising away.
Besides, vaping seems to be significantly reducing tobacco consumption amongst the young. Just let tobacco become an anachronism for the old and smelly with black powders muskets and classic cars. Let human nature do its thing.
I'm not entirely sold on the idea that vaping is harmless. There certainly seems to be some evidence it damages peoples' lungs, and vapes are getting into the hands of children (to whom they are clearly being targeted), and they are an unregulated product, containing an insanely addictive substance and perhaps a number of pathogens in many cases, whose long term health impact is largely unknown. If my kids started vaping I'd be pretty upset, maybe not as much as smoking but not far off.
I think there is good evidence that (a) vaping is bad for you, and (b) vaping is much less bad for you than smoking.
Interesting the Mirror has more Conservative readers than the Guardian and Independent now
Being slightly pedantic, that has been true for many years as the Mirror simply has a higher circulation.
I made the point earlier that it has long been the case that many more Lib Dem voters ready the Sun than the Indy, many more Labour voters read the Mail than the Guardian, and many more Tory voters read the Mirror than the FT.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Is rugby life-shortening? It's true there have been a handful of serious injuries and possibly some long-term issues too. But my guess would be that is massively outweighed by the fact exercise is fairly widely acknowledged to be good for you.
After just 24 hours, the government has dropped its commitment to reopen the Leamside Line. It was included yesterday in the initial Network North announcements, now it’s gone.
Roads minister Richard Holden tells me Govt is now just ‘committed to looking into it’.
Furious reaction already. @henrimurison says this announcement makes the entirety of Network North a ‘fairytale’.
Ha, the useless feckers already looked at it when the hapless Holden was a backbencher and ruled it out.
They really are utterly useless.
Perhaps look at expanding the Metro as advocated by Nexus/NECA.
Problem is NPR claim they need it for NPR to work all the way to Newcastle. Now I don't believe them but can't be arsed to read the details again that would give me an accurate answer.
I am generally on the side of liberalisation of drug policy so as to better regulate it so this flies in the face of that. I also have an inbuilt aversion to the concept of banning things, though can be persuaded otherwise.
However as an undoubtedly unhealthy activity that is in what appears to be terminal decline I understand the rationale in trying to hurry it along.
I think on balance I’d question the need for a ban. Smoking is becoming less and less popular as time goes on anyway, and the market will eventually treat it as a niche product and that will be it. At that point you can just make it so prohibitively expensive through general taxation (and lack of demand) that it will just become the preserve of the odd eccentric here or there. By actually prohibiting sale I think there is the risk that it becomes more exciting to youngsters as forbidden fruit, so as to make the whole thing counterproductive.
There are two main problems with banning tobacco outright.
The first is practical. Once it's illegal the government can do nothing to regulate supply and so ensure people get what they think they're buying. You might think you're buying tobacco, but there's no knowing what might be mixed up with it. If you're lucky it's nettle leaves, and if you're not it could be something worse for you than tobacco.
The second is more philosophical. I can't help but feel there is something very puritanical about the desire to ban mood-altering drugs. It's all dressed up in terms of cancer and addiction, but I think if a drug was discovered that simply made you feel happy, and had zero side-effects, you'd still have loads of people wanting it banned anyway. (Didn't they change the law in the UK so that was the case? Everything is banned by default, regardless of whether it's actually harmful, in a reversal of normal common law practice.)
Tobacco is, in my opinion, disgusting. It stinks, and it's awful for your health. I was delighted when it was banned from public transport and public buildings. But in a free society people are allowed to do things that are bad for them. If you cannot do things wrong then you aren't truly free.
And they won't stop with tobacco. They'll be after alcohol and sugar too, the joy-sucking fuckers.
I don't want to spend my retirement trying to buy black market sugar and worrying about its purity just so that I can bake some brownies.
If you start making one slippery slope style argument, you’ll go on to make many more logical fallacies.
Interesting the Mirror has more Conservative readers than the Guardian and Independent now
Being slightly pedantic, that has been true for many years as the Mirror simply has a higher circulation.
I made the point earlier that it has long been the case that many more Lib Dem voters ready the Sun than the Indy, many more Labour voters read the Mail than the Guardian, and many more Tory voters read the Mirror than the FT.
I am impressed how many express readers vote LD. Keen on the EU after all the over the top Brussels bashing!
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Who is this they? And is playing rugby actually life shortening vs the average Brit? Probably depends if the fifteen pints of lager and midnight curries are included.
Brain and spinal cord damage. Broken necks. Concussion. Not something to be taken lightly, let alone recurrently. IANAE but Mrs C knows about those things and winces when she sees a game.
Interesting the Mirror has more Conservative readers than the Guardian and Independent now
Being slightly pedantic, that has been true for many years as the Mirror simply has a higher circulation.
I made the point earlier that it has long been the case that many more Lib Dem voters ready the Sun than the Indy, many more Labour voters read the Mail than the Guardian, and many more Tory voters read the Mirror than the FT.
Yes but this is in percentage terms
I do understand the point you were actually trying to make, but what you said rather than what you meant was, "the Mirror has more Conservative readers than the Guardian and Independent". That's not actually a comment about percentages, and has long been true.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
Perhaps not, but we shouldn't indulge in flinging accusations of smokers 'costing the NHS money' as we seek to ban their pleasures either.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Who is this they? And is playing rugby actually life shortening vs the average Brit? Probably depends if the fifteen pints of lager and midnight curries are included.
Brain and spinal cord damage. Broken necks. Concussion. Not something to be taken lightly, let alone recurrently. IANAE but Mrs C knows about those things and winces when she sees a game.
Interesting the Mirror has more Conservative readers than the Guardian and Independent now
Being slightly pedantic, that has been true for many years as the Mirror simply has a higher circulation.
I made the point earlier that it has long been the case that many more Lib Dem voters ready the Sun than the Indy, many more Labour voters read the Mail than the Guardian, and many more Tory voters read the Mirror than the FT.
I am impressed how many express readers vote LD. Keen on the EU after all the over the top Brussels bashing!
I seem to remember in the past seen polling about those expressing wish to vote LD who are still anti-EU / Leavers being a surprising percentage, because they like other parts of LD offerings (or dislike all other options). And this was true even during height of Brexit.
People are complicated / Nought as strange as folk.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Who is this they? And is playing rugby actually life shortening vs the average Brit? Probably depends if the fifteen pints of lager and midnight curries are included.
Brain and spinal cord damage. Broken necks. Concussion. Not something to be taken lightly, let alone recurrently. IANAE but Mrs C knows about those things and winces when she sees a game.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
As Covid showed, people like restrictions on other people's freedom....
I'm a lifetime smoker and I support this. If only it had been in place when I started. I don't feel free when I light up. I feel enslaved.
Your own weaknesses shouldn't infuence Govt policy....
Should we repeal the drink driving laws because some people are “weak” and can’t control themselves balancing out how much they can drink and drive safely?
What Kinabalu wrote is exactly what I was thinking this morning. Finding it difficult to stop smoking is not “weakness” and there are many many different reasons why people find it hard to give up.
I guess you have absolutely no weaknesses yourself which luckily won’t kill you, damage those around you.
If it stops even a few kids from taking up smoking and dying unnecessarily then it’s good and not a liberal “freedom” hill worth dying on.
These are good arguments. But I would also want to draw a distinction between those things which only harm you (cigarettes) and those things likely to harm others (drunk driving).
Perhaps seatbelts is a better comparison.
I was going to use the seatbelts argument as well but was too pissed off with the obnoxious dismissal of smokers having a “weakness”.
Smoking does harm others though, unborn children, children, people who might live with smokers who are inconsiderate but it also harms other people such as the families of smokers when the smokers are dying painfully from cancer and emphysema and they have to watch them go because they were hooked to a horrible addictive chemical. People are harmed by losing loved ones and friends.
If someone invented cigarettes today and said “these things will kill you, damage your health, stunt your baby’s growth. You will be addicted and spend a fortune on something really bad for you and society but they will act as a crutch when you are stressed ” they wouldn’t be allowed to sell them at all.
And to reconfirm I’m a smoker, not an evangelical ex smoker or someone who has never smoked so makes generalisations without the experience.
And I’m a non-smoker from a family of non-smokers.
But I’m also an instinctive liberal who bridles at bans except where the risk falls beyond the individual (in which case, I fully support bans such as on the Bully XL breed).
I actually even wonder whether compulsory seatbelts is strictly desirable.
I think the case against cigarettes is very strong, but many people do enjoy them, and many make their livelihoods from them.
It's not really enjoyment though. The cigarette just quells the craving for nicotine that has been building up since the last one. And so it goes on. Itch, scratch, itch, scratch, itch, scratch. Scratching feels good but nobody in their right mind desires a constant itch so they can have the pleasure of doing it on a regular basis.
After just 24 hours, the government has dropped its commitment to reopen the Leamside Line. It was included yesterday in the initial Network North announcements, now it’s gone.
Roads minister Richard Holden tells me Govt is now just ‘committed to looking into it’.
Furious reaction already. @henrimurison says this announcement makes the entirety of Network North a ‘fairytale’.
Worth noting that Henri Murison is CEO of Osborne's Northern Powerhouse Partnership. If he is describing NN as a fairytale, it matters.
And as I have been picking at for the last 24 hours, the rest of it is crayons as well. Unless @HYUFD can tell us exactly what the Manchester North West Quadrant scheme is which was greenlit yesterday?
I don't think that is dropping it to say they are looking into it.
Murison is clearly an ally of Osborne who was strongly supportive of HS2
Its gone from - it will be opened to hmm if you are lucky....
Basically Rishi actually announced nothing yesterday because everything he did mention had so many caveats it will never happen - for instance Euston now reqires £5.5bn of private investment but no mention or idea where it will come from.
A bit more on Euston HS2. Building the station and tunnels from Old Oak Common now depends on private money, I understand. If there's no private sector investment then there's no Euston station and HS2's revised 8tph service will terminate at OOC.
It isn't going to look ridiculous until Labour are in government, or they will have to find the £bns to fix it.
If you were a Conservative MP with any interest in the future of the country isn't it best to resign the whip and declare your support for a no confidence motion in the government?
Bring about an election now rather than after another year of this sort of nonsense.
Monbiot is talking a lot of bollocks here. (Not all bollocks, but a lot of it is bollocks.)
There is an established methodology for cost:benefit analyses. It's not particularly secret and if Monbiot had the patience to google it he could have found it in fifteen minutes. It's painstaking and takes a fantastic amount of work. This methodology tends to be heavily biased against rail investment, because there are all sorts of benefits that won't be quantified and included - so doesn't tend to lead to white elephants being let through.
I also don't buy his diagnosis of clientilism. That's just not how it works.
I am generally on the side of liberalisation of drug policy so as to better regulate it so this flies in the face of that. I also have an inbuilt aversion to the concept of banning things, though can be persuaded otherwise.
However as an undoubtedly unhealthy activity that is in what appears to be terminal decline I understand the rationale in trying to hurry it along.
I think on balance I’d question the need for a ban. Smoking is becoming less and less popular as time goes on anyway, and the market will eventually treat it as a niche product and that will be it. At that point you can just make it so prohibitively expensive through general taxation (and lack of demand) that it will just become the preserve of the odd eccentric here or there. By actually prohibiting sale I think there is the risk that it becomes more exciting to youngsters as forbidden fruit, so as to make the whole thing counterproductive.
There are two main problems with banning tobacco outright.
The first is practical. Once it's illegal the government can do nothing to regulate supply and so ensure people get what they think they're buying. You might think you're buying tobacco, but there's no knowing what might be mixed up with it. If you're lucky it's nettle leaves, and if you're not it could be something worse for you than tobacco.
The second is more philosophical. I can't help but feel there is something very puritanical about the desire to ban mood-altering drugs. It's all dressed up in terms of cancer and addiction, but I think if a drug was discovered that simply made you feel happy, and had zero side-effects, you'd still have loads of people wanting it banned anyway. (Didn't they change the law in the UK so that was the case? Everything is banned by default, regardless of whether it's actually harmful, in a reversal of normal common law practice.)
Tobacco is, in my opinion, disgusting. It stinks, and it's awful for your health. I was delighted when it was banned from public transport and public buildings. But in a free society people are allowed to do things that are bad for them. If you cannot do things wrong then you aren't truly free.
And they won't stop with tobacco. They'll be after alcohol and sugar too, the joy-sucking fuckers.
I don't want to spend my retirement trying to buy black market sugar and worrying about its purity just so that I can bake some brownies.
If you start making one slippery slope style argument, you’ll go on to make many more logical fallacies.
That's true, but it's not really a slippery slope. It's the same puritanical mindset. "If it makes you happy it *must* be bad for you" is the operating principle.
Interesting the Mirror has more Conservative readers than the Guardian and Independent now
Being slightly pedantic, that has been true for many years as the Mirror simply has a higher circulation.
I made the point earlier that it has long been the case that many more Lib Dem voters ready the Sun than the Indy, many more Labour voters read the Mail than the Guardian, and many more Tory voters read the Mirror than the FT.
I am impressed how many express readers vote LD. Keen on the EU after all the over the top Brussels bashing!
I seem to remember in the past seen polling about those expressing wish to vote LD who are still anti-EU / Leavers being a surprising percentage, because they like other parts of LD offerings (or dislike all other options). And this was true even during height of Brexit.
People are complicated / Nought as strange as folk.
IIRC about a third of those voting lib dem at the 2015 GE went on to vote Leave.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Who is this they? And is playing rugby actually life shortening vs the average Brit? Probably depends if the fifteen pints of lager and midnight curries are included.
Brain and spinal cord damage. Broken necks. Concussion. Not something to be taken lightly, let alone recurrently. IANAE but Mrs C knows about those things and winces when she sees a game.
I am generally on the side of liberalisation of drug policy so as to better regulate it so this flies in the face of that. I also have an inbuilt aversion to the concept of banning things, though can be persuaded otherwise.
However as an undoubtedly unhealthy activity that is in what appears to be terminal decline I understand the rationale in trying to hurry it along.
I think on balance I’d question the need for a ban. Smoking is becoming less and less popular as time goes on anyway, and the market will eventually treat it as a niche product and that will be it. At that point you can just make it so prohibitively expensive through general taxation (and lack of demand) that it will just become the preserve of the odd eccentric here or there. By actually prohibiting sale I think there is the risk that it becomes more exciting to youngsters as forbidden fruit, so as to make the whole thing counterproductive.
There are two main problems with banning tobacco outright.
The first is practical. Once it's illegal the government can do nothing to regulate supply and so ensure people get what they think they're buying. You might think you're buying tobacco, but there's no knowing what might be mixed up with it. If you're lucky it's nettle leaves, and if you're not it could be something worse for you than tobacco.
The second is more philosophical. I can't help but feel there is something very puritanical about the desire to ban mood-altering drugs. It's all dressed up in terms of cancer and addiction, but I think if a drug was discovered that simply made you feel happy, and had zero side-effects, you'd still have loads of people wanting it banned anyway. (Didn't they change the law in the UK so that was the case? Everything is banned by default, regardless of whether it's actually harmful, in a reversal of normal common law practice.)
Tobacco is, in my opinion, disgusting. It stinks, and it's awful for your health. I was delighted when it was banned from public transport and public buildings. But in a free society people are allowed to do things that are bad for them. If you cannot do things wrong then you aren't truly free.
And they won't stop with tobacco. They'll be after alcohol and sugar too, the joy-sucking fuckers.
I don't want to spend my retirement trying to buy black market sugar and worrying about its purity just so that I can bake some brownies.
There was some bloke on the radio the other day (a statistician, I think), who kicked off the discussion by stating that about 30% of British people would be in favour of a ban, regardless of what was being banned. Apparently there is a significant segment of the population that just likes banning things.
Monbiot is talking a lot of bollocks here. (Not all bollocks, but a lot of it is bollocks.)
There is an established methodology for cost:benefit analyses. It's not particularly secret and if Monbiot had the patience to google it he could have found it in fifteen minutes. It's painstaking and takes a fantastic amount of work. This methodology tends to be heavily biased against rail investment, because there are all sorts of benefits that won't be quantified and included - so doesn't tend to lead to white elephants being let through.
I also don't buy his diagnosis of clientilism. That's just not how it works.
Yet round here the only announcement that hasn't been killed outright is a branch line between Ferryhill (small town on outskirts of Durham) and Billingham / Stockton - neither of which are places that have any connection to each other to the extent that there are no direct roads...
If smoking is banned it undermines the case for liberalisation of drugs laws, which I seem to recall quite a few posters on here are in favour of.
Indeed. I would suggest waiting five years and seeing if a significant illicit trade to the underage group appears in NZ, and if so how related is it to organised crime. I suspect the illicit trade will just be casual amongst acquantences rather than organised but don't see why we need to rush this when we will have real life evidence soon enough.
I am generally on the side of liberalisation of drug policy so as to better regulate it so this flies in the face of that. I also have an inbuilt aversion to the concept of banning things, though can be persuaded otherwise.
However as an undoubtedly unhealthy activity that is in what appears to be terminal decline I understand the rationale in trying to hurry it along.
I think on balance I’d question the need for a ban. Smoking is becoming less and less popular as time goes on anyway, and the market will eventually treat it as a niche product and that will be it. At that point you can just make it so prohibitively expensive through general taxation (and lack of demand) that it will just become the preserve of the odd eccentric here or there. By actually prohibiting sale I think there is the risk that it becomes more exciting to youngsters as forbidden fruit, so as to make the whole thing counterproductive.
There are two main problems with banning tobacco outright.
The first is practical. Once it's illegal the government can do nothing to regulate supply and so ensure people get what they think they're buying. You might think you're buying tobacco, but there's no knowing what might be mixed up with it. If you're lucky it's nettle leaves, and if you're not it could be something worse for you than tobacco.
The second is more philosophical. I can't help but feel there is something very puritanical about the desire to ban mood-altering drugs. It's all dressed up in terms of cancer and addiction, but I think if a drug was discovered that simply made you feel happy, and had zero side-effects, you'd still have loads of people wanting it banned anyway. (Didn't they change the law in the UK so that was the case? Everything is banned by default, regardless of whether it's actually harmful, in a reversal of normal common law practice.)
Tobacco is, in my opinion, disgusting. It stinks, and it's awful for your health. I was delighted when it was banned from public transport and public buildings. But in a free society people are allowed to do things that are bad for them. If you cannot do things wrong then you aren't truly free.
And they won't stop with tobacco. They'll be after alcohol and sugar too, the joy-sucking fuckers.
I don't want to spend my retirement trying to buy black market sugar and worrying about its purity just so that I can bake some brownies.
There was some bloke on the radio the other day (a statistician, I think), who kicked off the discussion by stating that about 30% of British people would be in favour of a ban, regardless of what was being banned. Apparently there is a significant segment of the population that just likes banning things.
That's interesting context for the famous figure of 20% who wanted to keep nightclubs closed. Turns out that they're actually relatively popular with the curmudgeonly British public.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
I am generally on the side of liberalisation of drug policy so as to better regulate it so this flies in the face of that. I also have an inbuilt aversion to the concept of banning things, though can be persuaded otherwise.
However as an undoubtedly unhealthy activity that is in what appears to be terminal decline I understand the rationale in trying to hurry it along.
I think on balance I’d question the need for a ban. Smoking is becoming less and less popular as time goes on anyway, and the market will eventually treat it as a niche product and that will be it. At that point you can just make it so prohibitively expensive through general taxation (and lack of demand) that it will just become the preserve of the odd eccentric here or there. By actually prohibiting sale I think there is the risk that it becomes more exciting to youngsters as forbidden fruit, so as to make the whole thing counterproductive.
There are two main problems with banning tobacco outright.
The first is practical. Once it's illegal the government can do nothing to regulate supply and so ensure people get what they think they're buying. You might think you're buying tobacco, but there's no knowing what might be mixed up with it. If you're lucky it's nettle leaves, and if you're not it could be something worse for you than tobacco.
The second is more philosophical. I can't help but feel there is something very puritanical about the desire to ban mood-altering drugs. It's all dressed up in terms of cancer and addiction, but I think if a drug was discovered that simply made you feel happy, and had zero side-effects, you'd still have loads of people wanting it banned anyway. (Didn't they change the law in the UK so that was the case? Everything is banned by default, regardless of whether it's actually harmful, in a reversal of normal common law practice.)
Tobacco is, in my opinion, disgusting. It stinks, and it's awful for your health. I was delighted when it was banned from public transport and public buildings. But in a free society people are allowed to do things that are bad for them. If you cannot do things wrong then you aren't truly free.
And they won't stop with tobacco. They'll be after alcohol and sugar too, the joy-sucking fuckers.
I don't want to spend my retirement trying to buy black market sugar and worrying about its purity just so that I can bake some brownies.
There was some bloke on the radio the other day (a statistician, I think), who kicked off the discussion by stating that about 30% of British people would be in favour of a ban, regardless of what was being banned. Apparently there is a significant segment of the population that just likes banning things.
I’ve been surprised by the support for smoking abolition on here.
I must be getting old.
It's a terrible policy, and a Labour policy to boot. I just didn't have the energy to get into it.
I don't think the numbers add up either. I believe that smoking is judged to cost the economy something like £17bn through illness. The Government takes £10bn in tax on cigarettes, and the smoking-related illnesses are probably offsetting other, potentially more protracted illnesses (like dementia) that could afflict non-smokers, not to mention longer pension withdrawals and social care costs, so that £17bn won't be 'saved' anyway.
People dying saves us money may be true, but I’m not certain it should be the basis of decision making.
If people voluntarily make life-shortening decisions I don't think it's any of the state's business to discourage it.
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
Who is this they? And is playing rugby actually life shortening vs the average Brit? Probably depends if the fifteen pints of lager and midnight curries are included.
Brain and spinal cord damage. Broken necks. Concussion. Not something to be taken lightly, let alone recurrently. IANAE but Mrs C knows about those things and winces when she sees a game.
After just 24 hours, the government has dropped its commitment to reopen the Leamside Line. It was included yesterday in the initial Network North announcements, now it’s gone.
Roads minister Richard Holden tells me Govt is now just ‘committed to looking into it’.
Furious reaction already. @henrimurison says this announcement makes the entirety of Network North a ‘fairytale’.
Worth noting that Henri Murison is CEO of Osborne's Northern Powerhouse Partnership. If he is describing NN as a fairytale, it matters.
And as I have been picking at for the last 24 hours, the rest of it is crayons as well. Unless @HYUFD can tell us exactly what the Manchester North West Quadrant scheme is which was greenlit yesterday?
Rochdale, I'm mildly disappointed. Why ask HYUFD when you have someone almost tediously Mancunian on the board with a penchant for banging on and on and on about transport? MNWQ is a road scheme linking the two separate sections of the M62, effectively bypassing the M60 between junctions 12 and 18, which includes the most congested stretch of motorway outside the M25 (i.e. the M60 between the M602 and M61). It's a scheme which has been knocking around for some time - certainly not a civil servant's BOAFP job.
Certainly there's a case for it. There's also a case against it in terms of the land acquisition/demolitions/impact on environment (though one version of the scheme has the whole lot in a tunnel) - as well as carbon emissions. I don't think if I was the decision maker that's the transport scheme I'd have picked - I'd have gone for a public transport scheme such as, er, HS2 - but it's certainly a valid scheme.
I'm asking him because he is our local happy clappy I will say whatever they tell me to Tory. You have just described the M62 bypass shelved in the late 90s. As I understand it the MNWQ *study* is looking at what options there are without bulldozing through posh people's houses in Whitefield and Worsley. There is no actual proposal. No scheme awaiting approval. No route. No costing. Just a crayon drawing which like so many of the lies told yesterday doesn't actually exist / is impossible.
Well 208 of the 216 members who voted him out were Democrats.
It’s all McCarthy’s own silly fault.
When he was elected Speaker, he agreed no more omnibus spending bills, then went back on his word and did a deal with the Dems for an omnibus spending bill.
If smoking is banned it undermines the case for liberalisation of drugs laws, which I seem to recall quite a few posters on here are in favour of.
Indeed. I would suggest waiting five years and seeing if a significant illicit trade to the underage group appears in NZ, and if so how related is it to organised crime. I suspect the illicit trade will just be casual amongst acquantences rather than organised but don't see why we need to rush this when we will have real life evidence soon enough.
Because people are becoming addicted to smoking and dying.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
The Tories are relying on people just swallowing the headlines and then switching off till after the next GE . You’d have to have the IQ of a fruit fly to believe they have any intention of delivering the transport plans they announced .
After just 24 hours, the government has dropped its commitment to reopen the Leamside Line. It was included yesterday in the initial Network North announcements, now it’s gone.
Roads minister Richard Holden tells me Govt is now just ‘committed to looking into it’.
Furious reaction already. @henrimurison says this announcement makes the entirety of Network North a ‘fairytale’.
Worth noting that Henri Murison is CEO of Osborne's Northern Powerhouse Partnership. If he is describing NN as a fairytale, it matters.
And as I have been picking at for the last 24 hours, the rest of it is crayons as well. Unless @HYUFD can tell us exactly what the Manchester North West Quadrant scheme is which was greenlit yesterday?
Rochdale, I'm mildly disappointed. Why ask HYUFD when you have someone almost tediously Mancunian on the board with a penchant for banging on and on and on about transport? MNWQ is a road scheme linking the two separate sections of the M62, effectively bypassing the M60 between junctions 12 and 18, which includes the most congested stretch of motorway outside the M25 (i.e. the M60 between the M602 and M61). It's a scheme which has been knocking around for some time - certainly not a civil servant's BOAFP job.
Certainly there's a case for it. There's also a case against it in terms of the land acquisition/demolitions/impact on environment (though one version of the scheme has the whole lot in a tunnel) - as well as carbon emissions. I don't think if I was the decision maker that's the transport scheme I'd have picked - I'd have gone for a public transport scheme such as, er, HS2 - but it's certainly a valid scheme.
I'm asking him because he is our local happy clappy I will say whatever they tell me to Tory. You have just described the M62 bypass shelved in the late 90s. As I understand it the MNWQ *study* is looking at what options there are without bulldozing through posh people's houses in Whitefield and Worsley. There is no actual proposal. No scheme awaiting approval. No route. No costing. Just a crayon drawing which like so many of the lies told yesterday doesn't actually exist / is impossible.
And to emphasis the fact - this is Salford council's last report
Quote: The second RIS (RIS2), confirmed that the transformational options identified by the study would have ‘adverse impacts on local communities and represent poor value for money’.
If smoking is banned it undermines the case for liberalisation of drugs laws, which I seem to recall quite a few posters on here are in favour of.
Indeed. I would suggest waiting five years and seeing if a significant illicit trade to the underage group appears in NZ, and if so how related is it to organised crime. I suspect the illicit trade will just be casual amongst acquantences rather than organised but don't see why we need to rush this when we will have real life evidence soon enough.
Because people are becoming addicted to smoking and dying.
That is the argument for drugs laws. Do they work?
Is anyone else as puzzled asI am at the 10% LDs who read the Mail?
I reckon its much higher if you count those that secretly log on to their website for the sidebar of shame. I have lost count of those I have seen when visiting university campuses whom I have walked past on their lunch break to see they are on the website, while having their EU flags adorning their desk.
If smoking is banned it undermines the case for liberalisation of drugs laws, which I seem to recall quite a few posters on here are in favour of.
Indeed. I would suggest waiting five years and seeing if a significant illicit trade to the underage group appears in NZ, and if so how related is it to organised crime. I suspect the illicit trade will just be casual amongst acquantences rather than organised but don't see why we need to rush this when we will have real life evidence soon enough.
Because people are becoming addicted to smoking and dying.
That is the argument for drugs laws. Do they work?
That depends on what you mean by "work". Do they lower usage? Almost certainly. Are there negative aspects to the laws? Definitely.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
After just 24 hours, the government has dropped its commitment to reopen the Leamside Line. It was included yesterday in the initial Network North announcements, now it’s gone.
Roads minister Richard Holden tells me Govt is now just ‘committed to looking into it’.
Furious reaction already. @henrimurison says this announcement makes the entirety of Network North a ‘fairytale’.
Worth noting that Henri Murison is CEO of Osborne's Northern Powerhouse Partnership. If he is describing NN as a fairytale, it matters.
And as I have been picking at for the last 24 hours, the rest of it is crayons as well. Unless @HYUFD can tell us exactly what the Manchester North West Quadrant scheme is which was greenlit yesterday?
I don't think that is dropping it to say they are looking into it.
Murison is clearly an ally of Osborne who was strongly supportive of HS2
Its gone from - it will be opened to hmm if you are lucky....
Basically Rishi actually announced nothing yesterday because everything he did mention had so many caveats it will never happen - for instance Euston now reqires £5.5bn of private investment but no mention or idea where it will come from.
A bit more on Euston HS2. Building the station and tunnels from Old Oak Common now depends on private money, I understand. If there's no private sector investment then there's no Euston station and HS2's revised 8tph service will terminate at OOC.
It isn't going to look ridiculous until Labour are in government, or they will have to find the £bns to fix it.
If you were a Conservative MP with any interest in the future of the country isn't it best to resign the whip and declare your support for a no confidence motion in the government?
Bring about an election now rather than after another year of this sort of nonsense.
Pah! Let them trash the Conservative brand further for another year - ideally take to the point of full-Ratner from which there is no coming back.
What is funnier - that yesterday's crayons announcement is falling apart, or that the usual suspects will now *deny* that is the case as HY just did. A crayon plan to compel the operator of Midland Mainline to run trains that the DfT won't allow them to buy from a station with no capacity over a curve that Network Rail haven't been told to build onto another line that is low on capacity and will be lower once the other crayon plan happens. Oh and deliver a journey time saving that is impossible at first glance.
Vote Conservative. Because Labour want to Axe This Scheme.
The Tories are relying on people just swallowing the headlines and then switching off till after the next GE . You’d have to have the IQ of a fruit fly to believe they have any intention of delivering the transport plans they announced .
I think this is a good call, papers like the Sun (if you can call it a paper) will ratchet up the rhetoric two months out from the GE, hoping their cerebrally challenged readers, will only start noticing then, and say to themselves, yeah I think the Tories deserve another five years, and who knows it's worked before
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
"Max strength" just overpriced paracetomol that you could wash down with Coke lol.
Someone in the pharmaceutical industry is taking notes: "What if we put a couple of paracetamol and a carbonated drink in fancy packaging and sold it for £10?"
"Max strength" just overpriced paracetomol that you could wash down with Coke lol.
Someone in the pharmaceutical industry is taking notes: "What if we put a couple of paracetamol and a carbonated drink in fancy packaging and sold it for £10?"
If smoking is banned it undermines the case for liberalisation of drugs laws, which I seem to recall quite a few posters on here are in favour of.
Indeed. I would suggest waiting five years and seeing if a significant illicit trade to the underage group appears in NZ, and if so how related is it to organised crime. I suspect the illicit trade will just be casual amongst acquantences rather than organised but don't see why we need to rush this when we will have real life evidence soon enough.
Because people are becoming addicted to smoking and dying.
That is the argument for drugs laws. Do they work?
Criminalisation reduces the number of people taking a drug. I think that's clear. The legalisation of cannabis in parts of the US has seen an increase in cannabis use. Criminalisation also increases criminal activity, which is bad. It has other downsides, like drug quality/not knowing what you're taking. There are arguments for and against. There are arguments for and against "decriminalisation" versus "legalisation".
Importantly, drugs are not all the same. I don't think anyone has a one size fits all approach. Alcohol is not ketamine. Cannabis is not LSD.
Smoking is not like other drugs. It is more addictive, much more addictive than many illegal drugs. LSD isn't addictive, but it's still illegal. Nicotine is a really shit drug. People get addicted and keep going, but it gives you less pleasure than many illegal drugs. If cigarettes were a new invention and illegal, it is unlikely they would take off because they just don't give you the same high as numerous other options.
Cigarettes etc. are currently available within a legal structure. The proposal is not to ban cigarettes. They will remain legal for older people. That's a very different context. It will make it easier for younger people to get hold of cigarettes, but it also avoids some of the problems that come with complete criminalisation.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
Get the fuck out of here. This is amazing! Crayons indeed!
Extrapolating forwards, HS2 will be completed in about 2090, will have cost £2 trillion and will stretch from Luton to Milton Keynes.
I don't see why a private company would err "invest" unless they're going to get a return ?
Promise of future Gov't work perhaps ...
£5.5bn is going to require a lot of immediate Government work....
We were part of a smaller scheme where essentially a QUANGO asked us for subscriptions. We didn't get chosen for a contract to do some work for them so we've left as it's just (expensive) advertising now to pay for one of the subscriptions. Still they're bods came chatting to our engineering director at an exhibition recently. We all had a good laugh about that.
Olaf Scholz is refusing to send Ukraine powerful Taurus cruise missiles, Germany’s equivalent of Britain’s Storm Shadows, out of fear that they will be used to attack the Kerch bridge.
The German chancellor is resisting pressure from Britain and Ukraine to deliver the missiles, the German newspaper Bild reported, despite reassurances from London that they would only be fired at targets approved by Berlin.
Mr Scholz is particularly concerned that Kyiv would use Taurus missiles, which have a range of 310 miles, to target the Kerch bridge linking Russia with occupied Crimea, Der Spiegel reported.
---
He is worried they might use them to win the war....
If smoking is banned it undermines the case for liberalisation of drugs laws, which I seem to recall quite a few posters on here are in favour of.
Indeed. I would suggest waiting five years and seeing if a significant illicit trade to the underage group appears in NZ, and if so how related is it to organised crime. I suspect the illicit trade will just be casual amongst acquantences rather than organised but don't see why we need to rush this when we will have real life evidence soon enough.
Because people are becoming addicted to smoking and dying.
Err, thanks for the health lesson but believe it or not I am aware of that, but think it right to balance it against the risks of helping grow organised crime. I can see why political discourse and consensus is hard to build in modern life. I am slightly in favour of the change you want, but want it done carefully instead of on a PMs whim, and simplistic emotional responses such as that are only going to turn me against it.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
Get the fuck out of here. This is amazing! Crayons indeed!
Extrapolating forwards, HS2 will be completed in about 2090, will have cost £2 trillion and will stretch from Luton to Milton Keynes.
I don't see why a private company would err "invest" unless they're going to get a return ?
Promise of future Gov't work perhaps ...
£5.5bn is going to require a lot of immediate Government work....
Presumably for £5.5bn they become a mini-Railtrack and get to charge access fees to Euston to the train operators. If the cost of borrowing wasn't so high you might find a few takers.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
Get the fuck out of here. This is amazing! Crayons indeed!
Extrapolating forwards, HS2 will be completed in about 2090, will have cost £2 trillion and will stretch from Luton to Milton Keynes.
I don't see why a private company would err "invest" unless they're going to get a return ?
Promise of future Gov't work perhaps ...
£5.5bn is going to require a lot of immediate Government work....
Presumably for £5.5bn they become a mini-Railtrack and get to charge access fees to Euston to the train operators. If the cost of borrowing wasn't so high you might find a few takers.
Well yes that could work, obviously it'd have to be passed on by the HS2 ticket companies...
Seriously I just can't see where on earth the private sector is going to dig up the billions needed here without future return, & it'd be against the duties to their shareholders if they didn't !
This isn't a few million or hundred thousand which might be able to be tapped up for indefinite benefit.
The HS2 link to Euston may never be built unless private sector investment is secured, officials have admitted, undermining the prime minister’s conference pledge.
Rishi Sunak used his speech on Wednesday to scrap the line north of Birmingham, but promised it would reach Euston in central London.
He said: “We will complete the line from Birmingham to Euston,” adding that construction of central London station would be taken away from HS2 Ltd, the government-run company tasked with delivering the project, and handed to a development company.
However, it emerged today that the whole scheme, not just the station, is contingent on a substantial proportion of the cost being met by private funds. This includes a 4.5-mile tunnel from Old Oak Common, west London. If the money cannot be raised, HS2 will permanently terminate at Old Oak Common.
Sunak said on Wednesday that the government’s new plan for Euston station will generate “£6.5 billion of savings”.
(The gocomics site, in case you are not famliar with it, carries many American cartoons, including political cartoons. And surveys of cartoons from much of the rest of the world, under "Views": https://www.gocomics.com/comics/a-to-z
For some reason it does not carry "Blondie", but you can find that at a similar site, arcamax.)
The incremental smoking ban. Have we considered this:
Under the proposed ban, someone who was born on or after 1 January 2009 will never legally be allowed to buy tobacco. But, SFAICS, there is no parallel provision about use.
So, one day in about 2106 a 98 year old will be nipping out with his birth certificate to buy fags for a 97 year old.
More seriously, it is apparently possible to buy cigarettes online. What will prevent people continuing to do so, either from the UK or abroad?
Is anyone else as puzzled asI am at the 10% LDs who read the Mail?
I think a surprisingly (to us) large proportion of the people who still buy newspapers aren't actually interested in politics. They might go and do their democratic duty come voting day, but politics barely crosses their mind on a day-to-day basis. They only buy the newspaper for the crossword, cartoons, gossip or astrology columns.
The incremental smoking ban. Have we considered this:
Under the proposed ban, someone who was born on or after 1 January 2009 will never legally be allowed to buy tobacco. But, SFAICS, there is no parallel provision about use.
So, one day in about 2106 a 98 year old will be nipping out with his birth certificate to buy fags for a 97 year old.
More seriously, it is apparently possible to buy cigarettes online. What will prevent people continuing to do so, either from the UK or abroad?
These type of bans aren't ever really about making it impossible to ever buy them, its more about putting barriers in the way that make it harder, so much less likely people start in the first place. The like the other end of the telescope of how online shopping has been optimised to make it as frictionless as possible. This kind of policy just introduces a load of extra friction to the process with the hope that people just don't get started.
Comments
I used to like playing rugby. That's a life-shortening decision too. I'm quite confident that if we let them come for smokers, it won't be long before they come for rugby.
J for Jacqueline in this case, although there has been some speculation about a female Bond post-Daniel Craig.
Murison is clearly an ally of Osborne who was strongly supportive of HS2
https://x.com/josephpolitano/status/1709672236108370333?s=46&t=L9g_woCIqbo1MTuBFCK0xg
A structural UK economic problem is they only have 1 rich city (London) and it has an extreme housing shortage
You could solve this by building more housing in London, connecting more areas to London, or spreading out growth (hard)—but ongoing UK policy is "none of the above"
"...Modern British politics consists in not building anything, banning stuff, telling people off, and calling anyone you disagree with evil/a racist/unworthy of holding an opinion..." - Aaron Bastani, 10:31 PM · Jun 12, 2023
Heartwarming to see.
* Just to be clear I am not saying this is what I believe, rather why we go through NVQ, GNVQ, T-Levels, whatever nonsense Rishi came up with over breakfast yesterday morning, etc.
It's also a bloody nuisance for anyone trying to get on an Elizabeth Line train inbound of OOC, as the trains will be too full to board.
The first is practical. Once it's illegal the government can do nothing to regulate supply and so ensure people get what they think they're buying. You might think you're buying tobacco, but there's no knowing what might be mixed up with it. If you're lucky it's nettle leaves, and if you're not it could be something worse for you than tobacco.
The second is more philosophical. I can't help but feel there is something very puritanical about the desire to ban mood-altering drugs. It's all dressed up in terms of cancer and addiction, but I think if a drug was discovered that simply made you feel happy, and had zero side-effects, you'd still have loads of people wanting it banned anyway. (Didn't they change the law in the UK so that was the case? Everything is banned by default, regardless of whether it's actually harmful, in a reversal of normal common law practice.)
Tobacco is, in my opinion, disgusting. It stinks, and it's awful for your health. I was delighted when it was banned from public transport and public buildings. But in a free society people are allowed to do things that are bad for them. If you cannot do things wrong then you aren't truly free.
And they won't stop with tobacco. They'll be after alcohol and sugar too, the joy-sucking fuckers.
I don't want to spend my retirement trying to buy black market sugar and worrying about its purity just so that I can bake some brownies.
George Monbiot
The relationship between those profiting from these big projects and those in power is such that no one truly costs or controls them"
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/sep/28/hs2-fiasco-clientelism-profit-big-projects
I made the point earlier that it has long been the case that many more Lib Dem voters ready the Sun than the Indy, many more Labour voters read the Mail than the Guardian, and many more Tory voters read the Mirror than the FT.
Tobacco companies have known this for many decades and have been manipulating nicotine amounts in cigarettes to maximise their return trade.
Basically Rishi actually announced nothing yesterday because everything he did mention had so many caveats it will never happen - for instance Euston now reqires £5.5bn of private investment but no mention or idea where it will come from.
https://twitter.com/philatrail/status/1709879961761329312
A bit more on Euston HS2. Building the station and tunnels from Old Oak Common now depends on private money, I understand. If there's no private sector investment then there's no Euston station and HS2's revised 8tph service will terminate at OOC.
Now kicking the vaping - that was by far the biggest challenge. But it was doable. And yes it was a pretty rotten four-six weeks, but I got there. Moving the vape flavour to something sickly sweet and then replacing it with boiled sweets was the way I managed.
https://jnnp.bmj.com/content/93/12/1262
PS Mind, footie (soccer) isn't great, if you are heading the ball. 'Heid-the-baw' is, after all, demotic Scots idiom for an idiot.
https://www.salon.com/2023/10/05/holy-entitlement-batman-are-furious-democrats-didnt-save-kevin-mccarthy-from-himself/
People are complicated / Nought as strange as folk.
If you were a Conservative MP with any interest in the future of the country isn't it best to resign the whip and declare your support for a no confidence motion in the government?
Bring about an election now rather than after another year of this sort of nonsense.
There is an established methodology for cost:benefit analyses. It's not particularly secret and if Monbiot had the patience to google it he could have found it in fifteen minutes. It's painstaking and takes a fantastic amount of work. This methodology tends to be heavily biased against rail investment, because there are all sorts of benefits that won't be quantified and included - so doesn't tend to lead to white elephants being let through.
I also don't buy his diagnosis of clientilism. That's just not how it works.
Does playing rugby cause life to shorten vs the average Brit? I doubt it.
It’ll be more like 33 overs.
When he was elected Speaker, he agreed no more omnibus spending bills, then went back on his word and did a deal with the Dems for an omnibus spending bill.
https://sccdemocracy.salford.gov.uk/documents/s57204/Presentation - MNWQ - GPSP Nov 22.pdf
Quote: The second RIS (RIS2), confirmed that the
transformational options identified by the
study would have ‘adverse impacts on local
communities and represent poor value for
money’.
Why useless decongestants are still for sale
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlFF7A8nk0w
I just looked on Boots website and it is basically the active ingredient in most of the cold / flu products.
Promise of future Gov't work perhaps ...
e.g https://www.boots.com/sudafed-sinus-max-strength-16-capsules-10095625
Active Ingredient - Phenylephrine Hydrochloride
https://www.boots.com/sudafed-decongestant-tablets-12-10033028
Active Ingredient - Pseudoephedrine Hydrochloride
Vote Conservative. Because Labour want to Axe This Scheme.
Importantly, drugs are not all the same. I don't think anyone has a one size fits all approach. Alcohol is not ketamine. Cannabis is not LSD.
Smoking is not like other drugs. It is more addictive, much more addictive than many illegal drugs. LSD isn't addictive, but it's still illegal. Nicotine is a really shit drug. People get addicted and keep going, but it gives you less pleasure than many illegal drugs. If cigarettes were a new invention and illegal, it is unlikely they would take off because they just don't give you the same high as numerous other options.
Cigarettes etc. are currently available within a legal structure. The proposal is not to ban cigarettes. They will remain legal for older people. That's a very different context. It will make it easier for younger people to get hold of cigarettes, but it also avoids some of the problems that come with complete criminalisation.
The German chancellor is resisting pressure from Britain and Ukraine to deliver the missiles, the German newspaper Bild reported, despite reassurances from London that they would only be fired at targets approved by Berlin.
Mr Scholz is particularly concerned that Kyiv would use Taurus missiles, which have a range of 310 miles, to target the Kerch bridge linking Russia with occupied Crimea, Der Spiegel reported.
---
He is worried they might use them to win the war....
A good proportion of LDs voted Leave, from memory?
Seriously I just can't see where on earth the private sector is going to dig up the billions needed here without future return, & it'd be against the duties to their shareholders if they didn't !
This isn't a few million or hundred thousand which might be able to be tapped up for indefinite benefit.
(The gocomics site, in case you are not famliar with it, carries many American cartoons, including political cartoons. And surveys of cartoons from much of the rest of the world, under "Views": https://www.gocomics.com/comics/a-to-z
For some reason it does not carry "Blondie", but you can find that at a similar site, arcamax.)
Under the proposed ban, someone who was born on or after 1 January 2009 will never legally be allowed to buy tobacco. But, SFAICS, there is no parallel provision about use.
So, one day in about 2106 a 98 year old will be nipping out with his birth certificate to buy fags for a 97 year old.
More seriously, it is apparently possible to buy cigarettes online. What will prevent people continuing to do so, either from the UK or abroad?