Ventilation is a simple truth

Several matters have cropped up this week which show just how desperate the anti smoking lobby are to maintain their stance against the non existent 'deadly perils' of SHS. We had the welsh (I won't use a capital as they don't deserve one!) anti smoking lobby up in arms about an exemption being made for film & programme makers. How can you make 'period dramas' & 'real life' episodes of whatever when apparently, suddenly no one smokes. Utter bilge emanating from the mouths of the idiotic anti smoking nation situated to our left. No doubt Duncan Bannatyne would have weighed in with his guttural two-penneth worth but he was too busy having a heart attack - that wasn't a heart attack, perhaps he was in need of an anxiety reliever, a nice relaxing cigarette!Or maybe his kids fancied one after receiving the news!
It is the desperate state of the economy that is  now coming to the fore, as we with any sense predicted from 'Day1'. Although the world in general, especially the brown nosing media, have found every excuse under the sun to blame our economic collapse upon, the facts speak for themselves:- the smoking ban came first, followed 9 months later by the credit crunch/recession. In the meantime, the supermarkets clapped their collective hands with glee as their 'new best friends' (the smokers) now started loading up their Saturday morning trolleys for the weekend "home boozefest". Congratulations to a Labour government that was wooed/conned by 'the Bitch from Shoreditch' and all the other lying, scheming, manipulative anti smoking gnomes that contributed to the dungpile of 'fallacious evidence'.

We had to sit and suffer "That" report by the one and only Linda Bauld, a woman so far removed from sanity & normality that she actually produced a report (as wanted by government of course) that stated there had been "NO DETRIMENT TO BUSINESS" and thought she was doing a damned fine job! Incredible! I actually wonder how she kept a straight face when presenting this multipaged  instruction manual on the principles of manipulating the facts - no, I'm wrong there as she was nothing but an outright liar in print! Imperial Tobacco, amongst many, shredded the report in a matter of days!

We only have to look back to the CIU conference this year to see that in excess of seven hundred registered clubs applied for, and got rates rebates due to loss of business (Hello..... is there a Linda Bauld, accredited academic in the house please?) This is exactly the sort of bilge the entire smoking ban is built on-total utter crap! In five years we cannot, in any way, shape or form, prove that we have saved a single life with this idiotic total ban - BUT - we certainly can prove that it has killed off business after business as smokers find alternative methods of enjoyment.
                        The Red Lion: Once a thriving little business, the boards say it all. The licensees are out of work, the staff are also unemployed and the local council now gets no revenue from the Red Lion. Once a thriving pub, it is now empty, boarded up, even the for sale sign has fallen off and the government no longer draw any revenue whatsoever from this once thriving little business, instead, they now pay out, week after week, to those who used to work there. How clever they truly are!
Incidentally, the smokers that once inhabited this once 'thriving little business' have not given up smoking & drinking, they simply adapted to alternating between each others houses. The ex-licensee joins them, free of any rules & regulations. How clever government truly are!
Strangely enough, the latest country to enact the WHO's demands for total smoking bans has already reported massive losses for bars & restaurants-up to 50% actually! Bulgaria, a beautiful country relies heavily on tourism and locals using bars & restaurants, yet despite the losses already incurred the Bulgarian health minister is unmoved, saying that amending the smoking ban would be a step backward. Backward? In what sense? Do the Bulgarians also want to face the reality of what we have already got/achieved? I doubt it very much because all we have achieved is the opposite of prosperity-financial doom.
Our government has thrown another £2,000,000 of OUR taxes into their latest dumb-ass attempt to bully people into quitting; it's entitled "STOPTOBER" for the simple reason that the government thinks that if you stop smoking for 28 days you are cured - "Lazarus, pick up thy bed and win the 100 metres!" What a load of codball the 28 day stance is. I know many people who have done that bit, collected the government rewards and then promptly started smoking again-but you see, having a 28 day target suits government figures admirably! They can conjure up all manner of suitable figures after only 28 days. Smokember (November) has 30 whole days in which to enjoy whatever you like to enjoy. ;)
As these most erudite people state, it is not smoking that should stop it is the following:

• STOP the promotion of the scientifically unjustified propaganda to the general public about the supposed harm caused by “passive smoking”. (Junk science)
  
  
• STOP the Anti-Smoking Industry’s intimidation of scientists who know the truth but do not speak out for fear of losing their jobs and careers. (Internal career bullying)
  
• STOP the Anti-Smoking Industry's programme of “de-normalisation” of those who choose to smoke tobacco, a programme which encourages the non-smoking public to vilify smokers and depict them as social pariahs, legitimate targets for every form of abuse. (Social engineering)
  
• STOP the waste of taxpayers money in administering and policing anti-smoking regulations designed only to appease those who dislike the smell of tobacco smoke. (Defrauding the taxpayer)
  
  
• STOP the use of taxpayers money in lobbying Government for further punitive, unecessary and costly legislative change by anti-smoking “charities” – ASH, CRUK, .....etc.  (Quango funding)
• They go on to say:  
• CONCLUSIONS
  
  
• The case for the ban protecting non-smokers from lung cancer and heart disease has been shown to be scientifically unjustified.
  
• Prior to the ban, when non-smoking areas were almost universal and smoking in public buildings and the workplace was a thing of the past, non-smokers, who wished to, could already lead a virtually smoke free life.
  Separate smoking rooms would have made that absolute.
• Proper ventilation and an air quality standard would readily protect the long term health of non-smoking employees working in smoking areas.
  
• The ban has :-

• successfully appeased anti-smokers
  
• damaged smokers personal and social lives and those of their families and friends - especially for the most vulnerable of smokers
  
• increased the visibility to children of smoking in pubs/cafes, on streets and in the home
  
• increased smoking and drinking in the home
  
• all but destroyed our traditional pub culture and resulted in closure of pubs, restaurants, cafes and other social venues
  
• increased unemployment with all its associated misery and consequential government expenditure.

Legalising separate ventilated smoking rooms would substantially resolve the above issues, while leaving non-smokers unaffected and able to lead an essentially smoke free life.
That about sums the whole sorry mess up quite nicely methinks. No prosperity has come from this ridiculous total ban, no proven saving of life, only misery, scorn, contempt and hatred poured upon smokers. 
Now let me remind you all exactly why we have a total ban. Mr Liam Donaldson (the then Chief Medical Officer) threw a hissy fit and threatened to resign if a total ban was not ordained but what wasn't known at the time was that the medically obese (BMI) Donaldson had been promised a seat on the top table at the WHO if Britain adopted a total ban! That is probably why Patricia Hewitt (MP Leicester West) probably did a complete 'U-Turn' on the issue of private members clubs policing their own premises; ie, having separate smoking rooms-as was in the days of the snug! The nation has suffered terrible losses thanks to one petulant, ponceyfied MP who stamped his feet in temper. 
If there was, and it's a big IF now, a true & just court in this land then on 'evidence' alone this total ban would be thrown out-as plain packaging has in America-but there isn't one as the EU directed that Britain  use its legal system to maximise compliance. It has done as many innocent people have been convicted of smoke related crimes that they were blatantly not guilty of!

But where do we fight back against such a corrupt system when it seems that no matter what truths are ignored?
To start with you can sign this petition to the Scottish Parliament-it's open to all comers, no matter where you live. We have CGA Strategy declaring that another 5,000 'options' will close over the next five years-I think that 5,000 is a very conservative estimate!

One such organisation that can lead the way are the CIU themselves, the Working Men's Clubs who are also suffering from the dire effects of the smoking ban, with the most recent closure being the Didcot & District Labour Club & Institute. There are very few clubs that do not have at least two rooms and when common sense prevails, the obvious should dawn-even upon the most ignorant of anti smokers! One room for smokers and another room for non smokers.

 Simples!

In this months Club Journal a member asks a most idiotic question,  

"If smoking rooms were granted by government, who would be enrolled to police these smoking rooms?"

I answered simply: "The law would be policed in exactly the way it is now-by council spies, or in the case of actual crimes it would be committee members and ultimately the police. The basic concept is so simple, smokers in one room & non smokers, if they so choose, in another. What is complicated about that?"
And that my friends is all there is to it, separation of the two factors. They wouldn't need 'policing' as smokers would be happy to be inside and non smokers surely wouldn't venture into the lions den? But another very, very important factor has now been cast into the mix-ventilation (see petition above) which exceeds the required EU standard and claims:

The technology for such air handling has improved significantly in recent years, with some affordable devices "claiming a single pass kill rate of 99.999% of bio hazards while removing particles down to the level of 1 micron or below, equivalent to a single particle of cigarette smoke".

Now then, the simple question is this...do the anti smoking lobby profess to know more about this subject than the actual experts in the ventilation fields? I very much doubt they do, so there is no longer any need for a total smoking ban unless of course, the anti smoking lobby are getting so much funding from Big Pharma that they cannot let go!

 

test for stupidity? = the 453 MPs hoodwinked into voting for a total ban in the first place

test for ignorance? = the masses, the non smokers drawn into the hysteria of SHS being more dangerous than sarin gas. All those that mocked & derided smokers forced outside!
test for greed? = the big pharmaceutical industries using their financial power to buy their way to success
test for love of power? = No need now for we have seen how ASH, CRUK, RCP all relish the 'medical' power they think they hold, but they are being undone at the seams on a daily basis. Nanny Lansley relished his position as Health Minister, he wanted a country where tobacco played no part-he wanted to finish this country off financially-he is now just a 'go-for':go for this, go for that little errand boy!
The time for major fightback has come, before this country is financially ruined. The internal economy is all but dead yet now we have the proof that ventilation & separation works there is no need to bankrupt this country. Lets unite and get our social lives back on track by being in a pub or club that has separate rooms-what a Christmas present that would be for all the pubs and clubs that believe in choice, that believe in democracy!