Proposed Smoking Legislation

[CaveMum]

A new report has been released suggesting that smoking be banned in cars and in public places where children are likely to see smokers, ie playgrounds, outside school gates, etc. Read more here

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

I will state that I am a non-smoker and always have been - watching my grandad die from lung cancer when I was 10 was enough to put me off the idea for life.

At the risk of antangonising some people I gave to say I'm a little fed up of smokers complaining about their rights being infringed. Do children not have the right to breath clean-ish air?
Before the smoking ban came in I frequently had to leave pubs and clubs with my eyes streaming from the smoke and it was foul to wake up in the mornings with hair and clothes that smelt like an ashtray!

I think the legislation we have at the moment is as far as the government can reasonably go with it, any further and they just have to stop pussyfooting around and ban it outright.
It is ridiculous to legislate to this degree on something that is perfectly legal.

Either have the courage of your convictions and ban it or leave it alone.

(I am a smoker who smokes only in my own back garden so wouldn't actually be affected by any further legislation)

It's all very well proposing new criminalising laws like these but how will they be policed? It is illegal to use a mobile phone while driving but everyone does it (particularly mothers on the school run).

I think it is horrid to see children stuck in a car full of fag smoke because the parents are too stupid/selfish to refrain but I think it would be impossible to enforce.

it's ridiculous, they need to ban them if they're that bad, no more of this pathetic banning in certain places.

Fair enough.. I don't like people smoking near my dc's.. What bugs me most are the wafts of smoke from people walking in front of you and ciggies held low down at the same height as childrens faces.

Can't see how they are going to police this though.. In all honesty.. They'd be better off just making it illegal (barring the tax gains from it). And I say this as a smoker!

They won't ban it - tax from smoking is currently funding the armed forces...

I smoke and I live outside the UK, but, me and dh were watching the one show last night. This issue was a feature and we both agreed that it would be a good thing to ban smoking in cars with children. neither of us could work out how it would be enforced.

i smoke and would never smoke with a child in the car, however this also suggests banning smoking where a child can see it? so you wouldnt be able to smoke in your own car even if you have no kids, never have a child in your car and keep all your windows shut so there is no chance of smoke going near anyone else? its slightly over the top for something that is totally legal.

I think we have enough things banned as it is. There are already vast swathes of eneforceable, reactionary legislation on the books. Why add to it?

*unenforecable. grr

If the government really wanted to stop smoking, they could put on enough tax to triple the price overnight. Dh spends £30 a week on cigarettes and keeps making halfhearted attempts to stop. Make it £90 and I think he'd actually put some real effort in - and thousands like him would too. In 10 years it'll be £90 a week anyway but people will be paying (and dying) because it crept up gradually.

Smokers will only feel victimised if they're forbidden to smoke in their cars. They'll just go back to smoking in their houses even if kids live there,where no one can see (Dh doesn't smoke in the house, at least).

I think it's a bit much to ban it in open spaces but certainly something needs to be done to stop people smoking in cars. They are such small confined spaces, it's years since I was in a car with a smoker but I remember that horrid smokiness well enough. Even in their homes, people can go to another room if they must but there's no escape in a car. No idea how you police it though.

"
At the risk of antangonising some people I gave to say I'm a little fed up of smokers complaining about their rights being infringed. Do children not have the right to breath clean-ish air?"

Think about the amount that smoking contributes to ruining the 'clean air', it's miniscule. I'm not a smoker BTW but think that banning it in enclosed public spaces as has been done in many countries is a sensible compromise for both sides of the argument.

If they want to make it a criminal offence to smoke in cars to protect children from passive smoking, shouldn't they also make it a criminal offence for a pregnant woman to smoke, which is arguably far more harmful?

Incidentally I think the legislation would be pointless. It can't be policed and people who are selfish enough to fill the car with smoke while their kids are in the back probably don't care much in other areas of their parenting either. Introducing laws won't make people better parents.

"Do children not have the right to breath clean-ish air?"

Yes I guess they do, so lets get all forms of engined transport off the roads, tracks, seas and out of the skies, close down industries, kill off all those nasty polluting furry animals that expel methane at high levels, cap those silly old volcanos and then of course we can ban smoking.

But of course that will never happen because it's only nasty evil dirty smokers who are a danger to our children.

They can't/won't even enforce car seats use how on earth "they" think they'd enforce a ban on smoking I don't know.
Smoking is either legal or it isn't, I do agree with the pub/restaurant ban though.

"I do agree with the pub/restaurant ban though."

I'm a smoker (shocker) and agree with the resturant ban ( I hate people smoking around food ), the pub ban though is a lot harsh, they should have either allowed pubs to opt in/out therefore giving non smokers the chance to vote with there feet or they should have a seperate room (with air con etc) for smokers.

atlantis You need to think about the staff as well as the punters - is it fair (or legal) to expect someone to expose themselves to such danger in their workplace?

Personally, I feel that smoking should be banned in all public places - but then I am a non smoker

I also feel that children need to be protected from adults putting them in danger but I have no idea how one could do this - education I guess and hope that smoking dies a natural death?

I'm a smoker and feel that people should not be smoking in playgrounds or in cars with children anyways, but some people are just nuts to think that it's okay to do that anyways.

Pubs should have been allowed smoking rooms raher than banning it in pubs outright as many lost trade when that ban came in!

However out on the street? I think that smoking should be allowed on the street, I enjoy a fag with my walk. What they need to actually do is get more bins. I hate dropping fags on the floor because I've seen kids pick them up and throw them straight in the gob but there is no where else to put it because of lack of bins -_-

On children having the right to clean air, when you use that argument to talk about banning petrol/diesel cars I will then listen to it

*anyway

"atlantis You need to think about the staff as well as the punters - is it fair (or legal) to expect someone to expose themselves to such danger in their workplace?"

Err, so your going with the arguement that people who work in pubs don't smoke?

Bartsaff, like punters have the choice to work in the smoking area which i'm sure the ones who smoke would be glad of the choice, saves them having to stand outside in the pi**ing rain on their fag break.

The problem with an opt in/ opt out option on the ban on smoking in bars/restaurants is that 99% of establishments would chose to allow smoking for fear of losing customers. This leaves non-smokers with the choice of staying at home or passively smoking, not exactly fair for them who are, after all, the majority.

As for having a smoking area, most bars/restaurants are one big room so any smoke will drift into the "non-smoking" area thus defeating the object.

Personally I would like to see smoking banned altogether, but it will never happen as long as the Government are taxing them. I can't think of any other legal substance that is 99% guaranteed to harm you! Yes alcohol is bad for you in excessive amounts, but you can't say that one or two cigarettes a day are not harmful in some way.

I back this wholehartedly...I remember the hideous journeys with my dad smoking - (that's a sick face)

I wasn't pro banning smoking in pubs...I chose to go in pubs, and clubs. I accepted that I would come home stinking of fags, it was my chilce, but it wasn't my choice to be cooped up with a smoker on a car journey as a child.

and anyone who smokes in a char with a child is just a selfish idiot, IMO.

I remember my mum sat in the back of the car with a twin in one arm and a fag in the other whilst my 6 year old sister held the other one, step dad in the front smoking and them going mental because I opened the window and it was cold
You won't stop people doing it because they don't think they are doing anything wrong.

• sister held the other twin not the fag

"You won't stop people doing it because they don't think they are doing anything wrong. "

I on the other hand get moaned at by my dd repeatedly because I smoke before getting in the car, she says it's 'time wasting' and if I smoke and drove 'we would be there sooner', bless , she must have picked up lessons in time management from somewhere ?