UK Politics General Discussion

[Poisson]

They aren't putting immigrants in Scampton I don't think, surprised that's not become a prison

 

[Matt.GC]

You'd think Merlin would be well into all this. They could fit 2, maybe 3 inmates into the old Thirteen shop?

I might send this proposal to Mr O'Neill. Build HMP Alton out of the abundance of shipping containers Merlin seems to own, near coaster corner. Rent it out to the Government to fill up with scum. Voila! You've got:

A. Access to the lucrative prison space market, making your existing stock of shipping containers earn income.

B. Better terms for Aramark, they can batch cook their crap and fulfill both their prison and Alton contracts from a single site!

C. Employ less Scarefest actors. Stagger the crims daily exorcise time, and allow them to roam the park for an hour each during Scarefest days.

D. The typical Merlin theming structure for Project Horizon is sorted!

 

[rob666]

Reports of the government considering a rise in fuel duties...
Favourite old chestnut, but I do hope the focus is on both air and road fuel duties.
It would be a shame if the focus was on essential fuel, rather than leisure, non essential fuel...Good old Tony wanted a tax on aviation fuel all those years ago when he was meant to be in charge, but the nice people in europe put a mocker on it, we will sort it out soon they said...all those years ago.
Perhaps the prime minister could do something with aviation fuel taxation now we know what a pig it is for global warming and climate change, now we are independent of our polluting continental friends who do not seem to want a change.

Tax those that can afford it, not just the essential users who are feeling the squeeze...double benefit, discourage needless air travel, and boost the treasury.

 

[Matt N]

Interestingly, the government is allegedly looking to extend the indoor smoking ban to outdoor public spaces where large groups of people are concentrated, such as in pub gardens, outside football stadiums, and outside universities: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cg79ym5mrzyo

Some in the Conservative Party feel that this is a “draconian step”, and others, including some in the Labour Party, are concerned about the financial impact it may have on the hospitality industry.

The government are said to be proposing this alongside the revival of Rishi Sunak’s phased smoking ban legislation that he was unable to get approved prior to the election.

I think this would be a good move myself; it will stop children and people who don’t smoke from having to inhale second-hand smoke in public areas.

 

[BarryZola]

Reports of the government considering a rise in fuel duties...
Favourite old chestnut, but I do hope the focus is on both air and road fuel duties.
It would be a shame if the focus was on essential fuel, rather than leisure, non essential fuel...Good old Tony wanted a tax on aviation fuel all those years ago when he was meant to be in charge, but the nice people in europe put a mocker on it, we will sort it out soon they said...all those years ago.
Perhaps the prime minister could do something with aviation fuel taxation now we know what a pig it is for global warming and climate change, now we are independent of our polluting continental friends who do not seem to want a change.

Tax those that can afford it, not just the essential users who are feeling the squeeze...double benefit, discourage needless air travel, and boost the treasury.

They don't want to hurt the share prices of aviation firms or discourage tourism. Domestic road user is an easy target who has no choice but to use their vehicles to get to work. Easy choice for our puppet masters in various countries.

 

[rob666]

That was the shoddy excuse thirty years ago for refusing increased aviation fuel tax!
We are meant to be looking to raise taxation revenue from those that can afford it...if you can afford foreign travel, you can afford to pay extra for your leisure.
We aren't looking at other countries, we are looking at the dire financial state of our own nation.

 

[Dave]

Interestingly, the government is allegedly looking to extend the indoor smoking ban to outdoor public spaces where large groups of people are concentrated, such as in pub gardens, outside football stadiums, and outside universities: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cg79ym5mrzyo

Some in the Conservative Party feel that this is a “draconian step”, and others, including some in the Labour Party, are concerned about the financial impact it may have on the hospitality industry.

The government are said to be proposing this alongside the revival of Rishi Sunak’s phased smoking ban legislation that he was unable to get approved prior to the election.

I think this would be a good move myself; it will stop children and people who don’t smoke from having to inhale second-hand smoke in public areas.

I do think beer gardens over a certain size should have designated smoking and non smoking areas as it is annoying when the weather is nice trying to enjoy a drink outside and smoke billowing over you (and vapes) but I wouldn’t ban it completely.

Find it amusing that the Tory’s are against this when they just ran on a manifesto that included banning smoking completely

 

[BarryZola]

Bit harsh on smokers though ain't it? Previous governments allowed tobacco advertising and allowed people to get addicted. Then out of nowhere smokers were told to get out of the pub if they wanted a ciggie. Now they're being told that they can't smoke outside the pub. Imagine, you have to leave the pub and walk 50 metres up the road to find a quiet side-street so that you're not in an area with other people there. People should to some extent have a right to not have large plumes of smoke blown over them, but what about the rights of smokers to at least be able to go about their business, outside?

Sometimes I go to the pub with my parents and we have a coffee. Maybe we should ban alcohol in the pub? Why should I have to listen to people being loud or unruly because they've been drinking alcohol? What about my rights to not be bothered by someone nearby drinking actual poison?

Yeah, but people go to the pub to have an alcoholic drink? Yeah, they used to go there to smoke as well. They're both very unhealthy habits that would be banned if they were invented today.

Playing devils advocate to some extent.

 

[rob666]

OK...tied in with smoking.

Firstly, one designated table/bench downwind of the prevailing wind in a safe outside area...so smokers can smoke in a relatively safe space instead of down a dark alley/in the bushes.

Now my dilemma...
What about legalising cannabis, and taxing it heavily like cigarettes?
The habit has become more and more popular with all ages for a variety of reasons, and the country is being flooded with cheap foreign imports as legality in some countries has created a massive oversupply...and distorted economics due to false border rules.
The second factor, it would mean two to three million people would no longer be breaking the law while living their routine lives...many using it for assorted health reasons/wankles.
Increased taxation revenue, reduced criminality, managed, safer, open use, without the need for dodgy dealers, and you could stick 'em on the smokers table outside the pub with a shelter roof and airflow filters to keep the skunky stink down...

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

Bit harsh on smokers though ain't it? Previous governments allowed tobacco advertising and allowed people to get addicted. Then out of nowhere smokers were told to get out of the pub if they wanted a ciggie. Now they're being told that they can't smoke outside the pub. Imagine, you have to leave the pub and walk 50 metres up the road to find a quiet side-street so that you're not in an area with other people there. People should to some extent have a right to not have large plumes of smoke blown over them, but what about the rights of smokers to at least be able to go about their business, outside?

Sometimes I go to the pub with my parents and we have a coffee. Maybe we should ban alcohol in the pub? Why should I have to listen to people being loud or unruly because they've been drinking alcohol? What about my rights to not be bothered by someone nearby drinking actual poison?

Yeah, but people go to the pub to have an alcoholic drink? Yeah, they used to go there to smoke as well. They're both very unhealthy habits that would be banned if they were invented today.

Playing devils advocate to some extent.

Ex-smoker, never a vaper, have been known to dabble in goose food a la @rob666.

The whole point of the original indoor smoking ban was to get people to quit, make indoor venues more accessible for those who don't smoke, and make it slightly more difficult for people to start smoking (if they wanted to) in the first instance. Nudge theory. Limit the exposure to smoking in the first instance, and a few years down the line the smoking rate will drop off. It worked well.

I'm leaning toward extending a smoking ban to outdoor venues / areas, especially where food and drink are served. This ban isn't being extended to vaping devices, so there is an alternative if people need their nicotine hit. Vapes often have a sickly sweet smell, but it dissipates a lot faster than cigarette smoke and is immeasurably safer than actual smoking (please note the qualifier, not saying it is definitely safe but it is safer).

To conflate @rob666's suggestion of legalising goose food for everyone, in a controlled manner, and the proposed outdoor smoking ban, I think they go hand in hand. With the proposed legalisation of cannabis, I would only permit consumption within the confines of a private home. Smoke a joint in your living room, smoke one in your garden, smoke at someone else's, but don't light up a joint in a pub's beer garden. The associated smell, and other factors, unfairly potentially spoil the enjoyment of the outdoors for others around you. I think it's fair to potentially extend this to smoking tobacco. Smoke in your own home, smoke in the garden, smoke in the homes of others, don't smoke in a pub's beer garden.

I would have suggested designated smoking areas for outdoor use, but if my experiences visiting theme parks are anything to go by, this just doesn't work. People don't use them and for practicality reasons they're often on a main thoroughfare, so they aren't actually achieving anything either. It's the equivalent of the "no smoking section" in a restaurant, a half arsed solution that didn't work for anyone.

 

[BarryZola]

Why not just extend the ban to back gardens too though? In summer, why can't I have my back doors open (ooo errr) and sit out in the garden without having plumes of smoke from my chain-smoking neighbour seeping over the fence all day? I paid a lot of money for this garden and now I'm not allowed to go out and enjoy it because the government is allowing my neighbour to intoxicate my air. In fact, it's even worse at home because you're trapped because that's the place where you live. If people want to smoke at home they should just smoke inside and have an extractor fan to the very top of their house so that when the smoke comes out it goes directly into the sky so as not to offend anyone...

 

[jon81uk]

Bit harsh on smokers though ain't it? Previous governments allowed tobacco advertising and allowed people to get addicted. Then out of nowhere smokers were told to get out of the pub if they wanted a ciggie. Now they're being told that they can't smoke outside the pub. Imagine, you have to leave the pub and walk 50 metres up the road to find a quiet side-street so that you're not in an area with other people there. People should to some extent have a right to not have large plumes of smoke blown over them, but what about the rights of smokers to at least be able to go about their business, outside?

Sometimes I go to the pub with my parents and we have a coffee. Maybe we should ban alcohol in the pub? Why should I have to listen to people being loud or unruly because they've been drinking alcohol? What about my rights to not be bothered by someone nearby drinking actual poison?

Yeah, but people go to the pub to have an alcoholic drink? Yeah, they used to go there to smoke as well. They're both very unhealthy habits that would be banned if they were invented today.

Playing devils advocate to some extent.

The indoor smoking ban was 2007, 17 years ago so a number of people now starting to go to pubs won't remember when you could smoke indoors, someone would have to be 33 or older to have smoked inside and 35 or older to have bought a pint while smoking indoors.

I think banning it in small pub gardens and having designated areas in larger ones does make sense, some are enclosed by fence/walls to the point where its like being indoors anyway, there is no breeze. Outside on the street where there is no privately owned seating would be different.

 

[rob666]

I did mention fans and filters...they are very effective, mainly currently used by the dodgy growers who also bypass the lecky meter to double the profits, but also for smoking areas.
They used to be used well in the local shisha rooms, until they all got busted!
Goose food indeed...

And upsetting the neighbours with the smell, next door were giving me stick until I pointed out that out back alleyway, on a long straight terraced run, on a main road, seems to be the precise length to facilitate the smoking of one joint.
The smell is everywhere round here.

Another thing, on the majestic Preston bus station, three convenience shops/newsagents in total, every last one has cleared out half the stock of general goods, and the walls are now lined with stack after stack of vapes...
It was never like that in the old days with backy and cigs, unless you were in a proper tobacconists...not many of those left these days.

 

[Matt N]

Sometimes I go to the pub with my parents and we have a coffee. Maybe we should ban alcohol in the pub? Why should I have to listen to people being loud or unruly because they've been drinking alcohol? What about my rights to not be bothered by someone nearby drinking actual poison?

Yeah, but people go to the pub to have an alcoholic drink? Yeah, they used to go there to smoke as well. They're both very unhealthy habits that would be banned if they were invented today.

Playing devils advocate to some extent.

The key difference between alcohol and smoking is that people getting drunk and being loud and unruly is not actively damaging people’s health, whereas inhaling second hand smoke can have a very damaging effect on people’s health if done too often. There are many studies suggesting that inhalation of second hand smoke can be very damaging to children and their development, for instance, and the effects can be very damaging for adults, too.

To be honest, I (perhaps controversially) wouldn’t mind some additional taxation on alcohol either, as that’s another significant cause of preventable health problems. But in the case of alcohol, I’d probably go the other way and tax it more highly for consumption away from licensed premises. I think people are more likely to binge drink and develop unhealthy relationships with alcohol in their own home than in a pub, and this could also benefit hospitality because people might be more likely to visit their local pub if the drinks there are cheaper than consuming at home.

As for legalising drugs; I’m never quite sure how I feel about this. A lot of left-wing parties seem to support the legalisation of drugs, but despite generally aligning with the left-wing parties, I wonder if it could end up being a slippery slope if drugs were legalised. I’m highly sceptical about drug legalisation being a good idea.

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

Why not just extend the ban to back gardens too though? In summer, why can't I have my back doors open (ooo errr) and sit out in the garden without having plumes of smoke from my chain-smoking neighbour seeping over the fence all day? I paid a lot of money for this garden and now I'm not allowed to go out and enjoy it because the government is allowing my neighbour to intoxicate my air. In fact, it's even worse at home because you're trapped because that's the place where you live. If people want to smoke at home they should just smoke inside and have an extractor fan to the very top of their house so that when the smoke comes out it goes directly into the sky so as not to offend anyone...

Whilst you're at it, my back garden isn't terribly far away from a motorway. Can we extend the ban to all car emissions too? I've paid a lot for my garden and I'm not allowed to go and enjoy it because the government is allowing my fellow earthlings to intoxicate my air...

I'm usually a fan of a slippery slope argument, but they can be a bit useless when you're trying to balance the respective needs of all parties. If the government really wanted to, it could just ban smoking full stop everywhere. It's impractical and complete prohibition never works, but they could. You can see this particular practice as trying to do the best for everyone, whilst pissing them all off at the same time.

Sometimes we do just need to be forced to eat our vegetables.

 

[Dave]

Bit harsh on smokers though ain't it? Previous governments allowed tobacco advertising and allowed people to get addicted. Then out of nowhere smokers were told to get out of the pub if they wanted a ciggie. Now they're being told that they can't smoke outside the pub. Imagine, you have to leave the pub and walk 50 metres up the road to find a quiet side-street so that you're not in an area with other people there. People should to some extent have a right to not have large plumes of smoke blown over them, but what about the rights of smokers to at least be able to go about their business, outside?

Sometimes I go to the pub with my parents and we have a coffee. Maybe we should ban alcohol in the pub? Why should I have to listen to people being loud or unruly because they've been drinking alcohol? What about my rights to not be bothered by someone nearby drinking actual poison?

Yeah, but people go to the pub to have an alcoholic drink? Yeah, they used to go there to smoke as well. They're both very unhealthy habits that would be banned if they were invented today.

Playing devils advocate to some extent.

That’s why I wouldn’t ban it completely but if a beer garden is over a certain size it’s licence should require a non-smoking area.

The analogy with coffee and beer isn’t the same, you consuming alcohol doesn’t impact your fellow visitor for the most part (accepting antisocial behaviour can occur but that’s a separate issue). Smoking does impact people around you.

But a total ban I wouldn’t support.

 

[rob666]

The government couldn't ban smoking everywhere...remember prohibition.
The black market would take over and smoking would continue unregulated.
You ask our shakey what did happen behind the green door.

edit...
Oh and Matt, we can tell you don't drink much...
Pint of decent lager when out for lunch on sunday, around six pounds fifty.
The price of four medium cans, roughly three pints in total, of good quality strong lager of comparable quality at aldi, four quid...roughly less than a third of the cost.
There is no such thing as cheap alcohol in pubs, even 'spoons very nice ruddles at 1.79 a pint is not strong in alcohol, that's why it is cheap.

 

[Benzin]

Smoking ban improved quality of restaurants and pubs. You could've been sat right on the edge of the non-smoking area and still be surrounded by smokers.

Follow Legoland Windsor's smoking area and have them all fenced off from public view.

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

As for legalising drugs; I’m never quite sure how I feel about this. A lot of left-wing parties seem to support the legalisation of drugs, but despite generally aligning with the left-wing parties, I wonder if it could end up being a slippery slope if drugs were legalised.

Alcohol is generally understood to be the most harmful drug of all, but we permit it in tightly controlled licenced environments. The slippery slope argument can't be invoked here, unless you don't classify alcohol as a drug itself.

"Drug harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis", a paper published in The Lancet in 2010, found:

MCDA modelling showed that heroin, crack cocaine, and metamfetamine were the most harmful drugs to individuals (part scores 34, 37, and 32, respectively), whereas alcohol, heroin, and crack cocaine were the most harmful to others (46, 21, and 17, respectively). Overall, alcohol was the most harmful drug (overall harm score 72), with heroin (55) and crack cocaine (54) in second and third places.

Source: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/...he highest and lowest overall,to 0·8 for khat.

I would highly recommend that you read "Drugs Without the Hot Air" by Professor David Nutt at some point. It's essentially a regurgitating of his findings in the study above, with some other bits, in a more accessible book format: -

https://www.waterstones.com/book/drugs-without-the-hot-air/david-nutt/9780857844989

(Other book stores are available)

 

[rob666]

Couple of thousand pubs went quickly out of business within a year of the smoking ban coming in...
Edit...sorry, crossing posts...I thought food and food alone was the biggest actual killer now, not drugs...obesity is our leading true cause of death, or is going to be soon.
Sorry, no real source, radio bloody four on the world service recently.