Smoking ban hits motoring

[johnmc]

Hi,
The smoking ban in Scotland is about to kick in, 6am Sunday morning. A few surprises appearing in the legislation:

- Not allowed to smoke in company vehicles, ever. Includes trucks, vans and cars. If a non-smoker has to borrow or ride in the vehicle company can now be held liable for smoke inhalation.
- Enclosed spaces include multi-story car parks, even if open at the sides. a roof is all it needs to be enclosed. Most firms drawing a five meter perimeter around sheltered areas.
- Bus shelters are enclosed areas.
- You need to stop smoking IN YOUR OWN HOME at least one hour before a tradesman, home help or any other visitor "deemed to be at work" can come in. Your house is their workplace and they can turn around and leave, or sue you if you damage them or their clothing.

Some scarey stuff, not just about smokers standing freezing outside pubs..!

John

 

[littlebrooklyn]

Evenn though I am in agreement for smoking bans I didn't realise it was going to get as stupid as that.

How can multi storey car parks be deemed as enclosed? All the ones I go to are open at the sides and as most people are either in their cars or just walking to and from them, I can't see how someone smoking could cause any problems for anyone.

As for not smoking in your home if you are expecting tradesmen, well that is just plain stupid. We all know that tradesmen never turn up when they say they are going to, so that's not going to work for a start.

 

[robbi-wan]

- You need to stop smoking IN YOUR OWN HOME at least one hour before a tradesman, home help or any other visitor "deemed to be at work" can come in. Your house is their workplace and they can turn around and leave, or sue you if you damage them or their clothing.
John

Look on the bright side though: In order to comply with this (stupid) legislation, any self respecting burglar will now have to make an appointment to ensure the air is smoke free when they arrive!

 

[Ian Brown]

People will be putting signs up and it won’t be saying beware of the dog, it will be saying beware there is a smoker inside or something to that effect.

 

[johnmc]

Anyone know a tradesman that doesn't smoke...! I know the odd one or two.

It's the usual nonsense, once you put a law on something every corner case needs looked at. A canopy or roof over something that stops smoke rising away is an enclosure. Now that the law is here every bandit that thinks they can make a claim and win a corner case will have a go.

Don't start asking about the marquis at the company party...!

As a laugh, the policy is that if going outside to smoke is "unsafe" EG: you may be killed or injured, then an exception could be made. The example quoted is "a submarine".

Almost fell off my chair!

John

 

[television]

People will be putting signs up and it won’t be saying beware of the dog, it will be saying beware there is a smoker inside or something to that effect.

Why not let your dog smoke, then you can get the best of both worlds.

BEWARE SMOKING DOG

malcolm

 

[johnmc]

Can't smoke at the footie, rugby or cricket.

I have say I was out last night in a restaurant that is already enforcing the ban, and it was great! For the first time in years I've come back from a night out and not had my clothes stinking because of someone else's dumb habit.

My wife is ruthless about dealing with smokers. She works in our local hospital and has told hundreds of smokers the ultimate bad news over the years. The usual response "never thought smoking would do this to me" in floods of tears, or "never hurt my granny, why me". Dumb and dying in slow agony.

As the ban emerges more details are coming out. Forget about having a smoke at the football, rugby and cricket. The signs are already going up at the stadiums for Sunday afternoon's matches. Mind you, us jocks are so bad at cricket the one guy that goes to watch Scotland can smoke if he likes!

No smoking or drinking at the game, just need to die from eating the pies then.

John

 

[psmart]

Im not a smoker, but it does sound daft. Same sort of pc claptrap affecting driving!

Take these pc idiots to some of the countries I've had contracts (Japan, HK, Germany etc), and they really will understand what smoking is.

Whatever happened to balance and fair play? Dont smokers also have rights?

 

[robbi-wan]

Whatever happened to balance and fair play? Dont smokers also have rights?

New Labour happened to balance and fair play and no, it would appear that smokers no longer have rights..........Burglars do, and immigrants but not taxpayers. Maybe that is actually fair and it is me feeling hard done to

What i cant figure out though is this: If everyone stopped smoking in the UK, where would the massive slice of tax income be taken from that is currently levied on tobacco products???

 

[Blobcat]

If everyone stopped smoking, drinking and driving the country would go banckrupt in about 2 seconds flat.
Any monies the Govenment lose by people stopping smoking they will levy on other areas of our lives. National Insurance at 11% anyone

 

[johnmc]

Fair comments. Do you believe that a lifetime smoker pays enough in taxes over their life to pay for the hundreds of thousands of pounds that their long slow death costs on the NHS? Err..no!

A packet a day costs maybe a fiver or so in tax, £1,800 a year. If they manage to live and smoke for fifty years (many don't) they only pay in £90,000 in taxes. Peanuts for their self inflicted problems. Won't even cover one operation on their lungs, all the scans, ITU care etc. National insurance will drop if smoking stopped for good. If you don't think so spend some time on your local cancer ward.

Smokers don't pay enough taxes, are a burden on the rest of us even without polluting the air around us damaging our health and stinking out our clothes. I've never yet been able to send in my laundry bill for payment, or sue for damage to my health. But things are a changing..!

The news for England and Wales is that there's been no economic impact here, the ban is coming your way. Pubs are still packed, just not with smoke.

John

 

[psmart]

Sorry John, your maths is a little out there. Accruing £5 daily into a Call Account on overnight daily rate will be more than double that figure (I'm not at work, otherwise I'd give you the exact figure, given current market trends). Add into this pot, the NI, both Employers and Employees (seperated for Pension, Health etc) your looking at 5+ times that figure over a 50 year life spread. Thats using the simplest of financial tools, start using complex swap derivatives, and the smokers pot suddenly is lobsided, in the smokers favour.

Smokers die early, their choice, so they cost the system less on pensions, old age care, old age disease etc. I think the whole equation is balanced, they cost no more or less than a standard non-smoking body.

My local Chinese, everytime I go, I have to have my clothes dry cleaned, not because of smokers, but because of pungent asian cooking. I still go, because I love their food, my choice.

Draconian quick fixes are never the answer, simple solutions, like enforcing penalties against smokers smoking in a non-smoking section of a pub, installing adequate ventilation are much more mature ways of problem resolution. I dont like smoke, but I like even less draconian laws robbing us of our basic rights.

 

[johnmc]

We could go much further and start to take into account the full social costs of smoking, time off work ill, too many breaks during the working day, cost of scraping the yell tar off the walls, costs of extra ventilation and special facilities. The list is endless. The pubs here are now re-decorating. Don't forget that the fiver wasted on fags every day could be used for alternative investments, wiping out your gains. Even if your gains in hedging etc were true it still won't pay the bills. I'd like to see someone claim a benefit to society from slowly killing yourself.

Careful, we'll be on to full NPVE calculations soon.

Smoking is just a raw deal for non-smokers. Stone age habits.

Sorry seen to many silly people die young.
John

 

[turnipsock]

There are people that go for a smoke on an hourly basis. A couple of weeks ago, the big fat bonde that smokes, drinks and drives a 4x4 was in a foul mood...not sure why, it might have been that the smoking ban that was about to kick in. It could have been worse, hair dye could have been taxed in the budget.

She also smokes while driving which I don't think is entirley legal either.

Walking through Stirling the other day, there was a lot of people ignorining the ban.

 

[Jay Kilby]

Hey Johnmc pehaps while we are about it we should ban booze as well we could also stop everybody putting any kind of fuel in there cars preventing potential pollutants killing you too!! in fact lets wrap the whole country up in cotten wool. our basic human right are being taken away from us which is fundamentaly wrong we are supposed to live in a democracy were the people have choice, nobody has ever forced me to stand next to a smoker in a pub, club or any other place, in fact i have found most smokers to be very polite if there habit is causing offence. whilst i do not disagree there is a considerable health risk attached to smoking i find it doubt full that a smoker in a carpark will have any effect on a non smoker. do not kid yourself if the country gives up smoking your tax liability will rise! because people will still die of lung cancer smoker or non smoker. i have lost four people in my family to lung cancer none of them have ever smoked!!! so what do we blame now?

 

[Ian Brown]

I think the should have put a ban on booze first think of the money the councils would save if they done away with the centres for battered women you never hear of a man battering his wife after a cigarette, but you hear about it after the man has had a few drinks.

 

[television]

I think the should have put a ban on booze first think of the money the councils would save if they done away with the centres for battered women you never hear of a man battering his wife after a cigarette, but you hear about it after the man has had a few drinks.

Or you get home from a hard day, and your wife is pi-----d out of her mind, and attacts you with a carving knife, one of mine was like that, she had to go,did a PX, and no comment on the next one.

Malcolm

 

[flyingtech55]

Look on the bright side though: In order to comply with this (stupid) legislation, any self respecting burglar will now have to make an appointment to ensure the air is smoke free when they arrive!

The burglars will probably be able to successfully sue their victims (using legal aid) for providing an unsafe environment for the burglar to operate.

The victim will obviously be prosectuted to the full wait of the law by the authorities because they are working, tax paying, home owning car drivers and therefore deserve to be screwed on principle.

Gliderman

 

[Craftsman]

It's obvious where they'd make up the shortfall. How about putting fuel tax up , everyone knows that all motorists are rich.

 

[psmart]

Or you get home from a hard day, and your wife is pi-----d out of her mind, and attacts you with a carving knife, one of mine was like that, she had to go,did a PX, and no comment on the next one.

Malcolm

She wasn't Thai was she? Thai girls go a bit like that, all smiles and roses at the start, then the alcohol abuse as they start clubbing 'cos every hot blooded male fancies them (despite them been hitched) and off it goes....