Campaigner wants smoking banned outside pubs
Anti-smoking campaigners want the Scottish parliament to ban smoking outside pubs.
Since March, smoking has been banned in all enclosed public places in Scotland meaning smokers have been forced outside the country's pubs.
However, it appears even this outdoor smoke is getting up the noses of anti-smoking at least one anti-smoking campaigner.
A local councillor is reportedly preparing to petition Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) to extend the smoking ban to cover chairs and tables placed on pavements.
Angus councillor Peter Nield told the Observer: "It is extremely unpleasant for non-smokers, including children, who have to walk through thick clouds of smoke on their way to a pub, or who are unable to sit outside to eat or in beer gardens because they are full of smokers.
"Some people think I am being over-zealous or have a phobia of smoking. This isn't the case. I am simply concerned about people smoking in a public open space and I'd like it to stop."
But Scottish Licensed Trade Association chief Paul Waterson said licensees could not be held responsible for the entire nation's health.
He said: "They are talking about banning certain types of food which can be sold in pubs and we are asked to control smoking, violence, drinking, litter and noise outside pubs. It is ludicrous that we are being held responsible for the nation's health."
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Your CommentsRobert Feal-Martinez via email 05/06/2006"Well don't say we didn't warn you. There is only one agenda for the anti smoker, it is the eradication of the smoker. Once they succeed in outside smoking then they will go after smoking at home. The peoples of the UK have got to start saying enough is enough, the SE and almost certainly the UK Government is going after food and alcohol. Sign up to the Freedom to Choose online Petition, it is not too late. www.thebigdebate.org - Do it today there is no time to delay.
Bill Gibson via email 05/06/2006"On the 24.05.06 Alan Thompson wrote ''All that people have to do is leave the pub or club, smoke their cigarette and go back inside'. Easier said than done Alan espacially if you live within Angus District."
Stephen Gilham via email 05/06/2006"So, an Angus Councillor wants to stop smoking OUTSIDE Scottish pubs. For pitys sake man, get a grip on real life. I feel sure that there are a million better causes to get behind given the problems in Scotland at the moment. And tell me, if, as you obviously want, everybody stopped smoking tomorrow, where are you going to get the tax that smoking presently provides? Might cause a few problems repairing the Scottish Parliament building when the next girder falls out of the roof when there's no millions coming from the smokers. Perhaps the plan is to put an exra tax on petrol, or the road tax, or VAT, or perhaps you will just make something up. What do you think the working people think of councillors and MPs who come up with one hair brained scheme after another and nothing seems to improve, except conditions and allowances for MPs and councillors. Rant over, I'm off for a smoke, if I can find an empty field big enough not to choke anybody."
Peter Harvey via email 05/06/2006"Well its welcome to communist Britain, BAN SMOKING, BAN FOOD, BAN HAVING FUN, BAN BAN BAN TAX TAX BAN well just like Robert Feal-Martinez says and Iv been saying for ages its about time people of this once great country stood up for their rights as English, Scottish or Welsh people before its all gone.
you will all be taxed on breathing air soon mark my words, and at the rate people are leaving this wreck of a country these do gooder idiots who keep thinking up law after law will have no one to make laws for, only the ones who shouldn't be here in the first place and they cant find them can they,
I'm proud I'm English but I hate the way this country is going, in the bin. I just wish I could get the wife to go live abroad."
Robert Kiggins via email 07/06/2006"I live in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where the city has just passed a ban which includes the prohibition of smoking in outdoor cafes ... There is no rhyme or reason to what is now possible since the anti-smoking brigades began getting their way.
It is now time to ban people who want to ban smoking.
PS - For the record, I am a non-smoker.
Peter Ferguson via email 08/06/2006"The advocate of banning smoking outside pubs is mono-maniacal as are so many non-smokers. They are likely to ignore the current, scathing report of the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee, which states that the smoking ban in England was a political decision, not justified by the relatively low risk of passive smoking. It points out the evidence of the Public Health Minister, Caroline Flint, admitting that 95% of smoking-related deaths are related to smoking at home and not in workplaces. The International Agency for research on Cancer recently concluded that, of 23 studies on exposure to smoke in the workplace, only one found a significan link with increased risk of lung cancer. The committee comncludes that it is concerned that the Goverment does not pay enough attention to the cumulative effect of legislation on personal freedom and choice.
Pro-smoking group FOREST comment that MPs have been hoodwinked by the anti-smoking lobby. If there is a risk, it is very small and certainly doesn't justify a blanket ban on smoking in every pub and club'.
In my own opinion, what freedom-loving smokers lack is an international campaign highlighting the flim-flam, the deliberate lies and the hiding of evidence such as the WHO studies whose conclusions were suppressed until the London 'Sunday Times' published them. Then the maniacal hysteria can be brought to an end."
Donal McCarthy via email 09/06/2006"Peter Nield: "I am simply concerned about people smoking in a public open space and I'd like it to stop".
That is the extent of and the justification for his policy.
Who voted for this man?
