Smoking banned in Scotland

hushed up obviously

you're allergic to smoke?? Thats a bit gay

All the death? Who's death? Are they doing it cause of cancer caused by second hand smoke, or just people who choose to pickle their own lungs? Tobacco is as good a long term suicide plan as I can think of, people should be allowed to damage themselves all they want.

And having gone back and re-read my post, I must confess, I spoke hastily. I don't believe that anyone other than the owner should ban smoking in a private place. If a restaurant is privately owned, I think the owner should be able to decide if his property is smoking, non-smoking, or smoking-segregated. If people want to eat at a restaurant that allows smoking, as long as no one's forcing them to go there, or putting a gun to their head to make them light up, it's their choice. If they don't want to go to a place that allows smoking, that's their choice too.

Adrian

So, do you also think that employers should be able to determine the safety of the workenvironment for their employees and leave it up to potential applicants to decide whether or not they want to work in a hazardous environment? Customers have the choice to expose themselves to second-hand smoke or not - employees don't!

As a non smoker i can say that "seperated" smoking area doesnt work.If you dont smoke then the smell of it is highly noticeable , so when you are sitting there eating your dinner and you've been placed next to the "smokers" area it just carries on over to where you are eating. I personnaly would like to see smoking banned in all restaurants.

Yeah exactly!!. I never smoked in my life but all my friends were and are smokers and ofcourse i hate it when they smoke all the time and i'm being passive smoker get effected and i can't do anything about it(unless i ban all my friends).

This is a very interesting debate, and has been going on both in England and Finland for a while now.

I am all for banning smoking in restaurants where people go to have dinner. But pubs are a different thing. I don't think smoking should be banned in pubs at all. In Finland, 30% of tables and areas in pubs have to be non-smoking, and this has brought in a lot of improvements, for example better air conditioning etc. If smoking in pubs is banned altogether, I bet the sales go down and a lot of pubs, especially small local pubs, will go bankcrupt. I think smokers should be allowed to go out and enjoy themselves just as non-smokers are, besides we pay a lot more tax in the form of cigarettes than non-smokers do.

As far as passive smoking goes, I do see your points of view. That being said, for example Kev said why he should be 'forced' to breathe impurities in his system when his decision is not to smoke. I read a recent research that the impurities in the air in centre of Oxford equals smoking 60 cigarettes a day. That figure is appalling! But we don't hear cyclists making a big fuss saying just because we choose not to drive cars or take buses, why should we be 'forced' to breathe this air that is caused by cars and buses. There are impurities and cancerogenes everywhere in the air, and we are breathing these all the time. They are there all the time, where as passive smoking occurs for a few minutes at a time.

I also read somewhere that if pubs are forced to become non-smoking, then a lot of private clubs and pubs will open, who will allow smoking in their premises. Adults won't stop smoking because of this, they will find new means. And they won't go outside and crouch like teenagers, they are paying customers and they won't do that.

And as for staff at pubs who are forced to become passive smokers, for example in Finland smoking isn't allowed in bars. And what about bus drivers, who have to breathe exhaust fumes all day, or people working in factories with high noice levels, just to name a few. I'm not saying this is right, I'm just saying that there are dangers in most jobs.

I agree with banning it in restaurants, but like Laura said pubs are a different matter. They tried to introduce it here in January and the Bill totally fell through becuase bar owners didn't want it! The idea was that everyone has a right to a smoke free environment, however what bar owners said was that most of the bar staff smoked and they feared that they would lose even more money if people weren't allowed to smoke. Turnover has been steadily dropping here since the introduction of the Euro, so if smoking is banned people will have another reason to stay at home. The Bill has now been moved to 2007 but I really don't think it will ever be passed.

The keyword here being "out". And the taxes are on cigarettes to cover the costs of health care needed because of the cigarettes.


People only stay in pub for a few minutes at a time? Come on, if you're in a pub, you need to breathe the smoke all the time. You may not smoke for more than 2 minutes but there are people smoking all the time.

Bus drivers don't inhale the fumes, they're inside their busses! And factory workers are forced to wear ear protectors if the noise levels are above 85db.

So why do us non-smokers have to have health-hazards in our free time?

Ice

Haha, maybe that once was the idea behind it. Tobacco tax is a nice money machine for the government. I do think though that this is a good thing.