This week has brought us the astounding news that Labour, in the shape of Andy Burnham, are delivering their final blow to smokers nationwide. I say 'final blow' because in 3 months' time Labour will be powerless, defunct, gonski.
In a 70-page document the carefully laid out plans to reduce smokers to 10% of the population have been described: they include:
a doorway ban - so that non smokers don't have to run the risk of walking past fellow workers who smoke.
the expanded issuing of nicotine patches - why? they already have a 98.4% failure rate. Perhaps they aim to get the figure up to 99.4%!
plain packaging - since when has the colour of a packet ever drawn a die hard Benson smoker over to another brand? and kids who do want to try the forbidden fruit certainly won't care what colour the box is!
the removal of tobacco products from display in shops - well, this will simply drive another stake into businesses. Many small off licenses and newsaents rely on cigarette sales to boost their meagre incomes. This will force even more closures.
the banning of vending machines - why? most vending machines are were in pubs & clubs, which means of course that you had to be 18 to be able to drink in such places! Again, businesses will suffer.
So, these orgasmically intelligent measures that will do absolutely nothing to reduce smoking rates will, in fact, reduce businesses! Until the smokeban was implemented it is well documented that smoker rates were steadily decreasing - quite nicely in fact. Since July 2007 this trend has reversed - has Mr Burnham realised this?
He also seems to see a future where this country is completely smoke free! Now we know that Labour's visions for the future all those years ago were warped, to say the least. Is it any wonder that we are currently in such a mess?
How Mr Burnham can possibly think that these mainly useless measures are going to do anything except send the likes of Debby Arnott into ecstacy is beyond me. She says, "the new strategy deserves plenty of applause, chiefly because moves against smoking must be regularly renewed and extended, as proved by evidence from abroad." Aha, so she must mean the tobacco sales increasing as well as bans being eased to accomodate business requirements. Clever stuff, Debs!
I look upon these measures as nothing but own goals from a failing government desperate to look as if they are doing everything they can to isolate smokers even more than they already are. In reality, they are pathetic - but then, Burnham is part of the 'NuLabour misgovernment'!
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