Jerome

Using your logic, we should ban all oil rigs because they are the most dangerous work places. Despite the fact that people choose to work on an oil rig - because they get good money - we should prevent them being able to work there because it's dangerous.

If someone considers being in a smoking environment "suffering", then it's rather a bizarre career choice to decide to work in a smoking bar. I would consider having to work in a kitchen as a chef "suffering", so I exercise my right to choose not to work there. Why don't bar staff do the same?

fast bloke

Can't see it being a problem during the winter. Many pubs have followed the example of the Odeon and installed industrial strength patio heaters in covered areas outside. Most rational people seem to support it. As a regular visitor I would say that it hasn't changed the pub culture in the south at all.


they do have a non smoking area - its called 'inside'

Jaybird-UK

Still, it'll be over here soon enough

Claudius

Very funny...

My point was that I can see smoking being banned from kitchens, petrol stations hospitals, etc., but banning smoking from pubs is like banning dart games or sandwiches from pubs because you could get a dart into your eye or get fat from the sandwich: although the main reason to go to a pub is to have a drink, there's a bit more to it than just the drink, and you're killing part of what a pub is all about.

Leslie

If you want to shorten your own life, that is your choice, but its not fair to behave in such a way as to affect other people.

Les

Jaybird-UK

I cant recall a pub with darts in it for years, anyhow you tend to throw at the board not at people, smoke though isnt directional it goes everywhere.

Ive also yet to hear of someone getting fat from another person eating a sandwich, would you call this 'third party eating' ?

Both are silly analogies, third party smoke is proven to be harmful, people DO die from smoking related illness and inevitably it will get banned in pubs & restuarants. Dont get me wrong Im not some anti tobacco **** but having experienced nights out in Dublin & New York its nice getting up in the morning and not having your jacket stink of smoke.

Smokers who I went out with in Dublin didnt really mind, one even told me you meet some interesting people in the smoking courtyard, but thats the Irish friendliness!

camk

yes very good, its all about minimising the risks and smoking is a clear and identifiable risk so its gets banned. In the same way they ban things on an oil rig, toi minimise the risk......BTW that chef isn't doing anything that can physically harm you.....unless he's smoking

Claudius

I agree, but having a smoking and a non smoking area would be sufficient. Or have pubs for smokers and pubs for non smokers, or whatever, but not just ban it completely.

camk

Having smoking areas is OK as long as they are completely sealed in and have air extraction, otherwise it just spreads.

Claudius

Absolutely. Good smoke extraction is very important. The fact that someone smokes a cigarette doesnt mean that he want to be sitting in thick smoke!

Claudius

s

(there you go, forgot that in my previous post )

Diesel

Took my baby for a pub lunch with mates after checking they had a smoke free area. She canme home stinking of ****... Not nice; not fair; didnt work.

Has anyone seem any solid evidence and facts on passive smoking yet? This would be the key to it all.

Norway's just gone too, and they smoke like Mediterraneans over there

D

fast bloke

Look at it like choices - I want to smoke and you don't want to smoke. If I smoke inside I get my way and you don't. If I don't smoke at all you get your way and I don't. If I smoke outside I get my way and you get your way. (The obvious alternative is that you wait outside while I smoke, but given that the smoke won't immediately disappear and we both place equal importance on getting another beer, then me smoking outside is the best case scenario)

Claudius

Why doesnt the smoking area / non smoking area thing work? Smelling the smell from a cigarette from the other side of the pub isnt exactly passive smoking, and it's part of the athmosphere, or isnt it? Sounds like some want to kill hundreds years old tradition for debatable reasons. Blowing smoke in someone's face is very different from sitting in a smoking area with smoke extractors and the non smoker being in the opposite part of the pub. You make it sound like smelling the smoke from a cigarette is going to make you drop dead right there and then...

StickyMicky

have a tab and chill out

StickyMicky

classic

nobody is allowed to smoke in my place of work except in the smoking room, seen people flout the law and be booted out within 5 mins for gross misconduct

its a serious breach of the working contract due to the really stupidly toxic chemicals we have to use (isocyanate and stuff) our canteen is really nice and clean, the smoking room is like a yellow pigstye

StickyMicky

what about the people who are forced to sit closer? its not like theres a massive space in between the 2 areas normally

mate, smoking smells are ****en rank!!!
you just cant smell how rank it is because your being to cool, and clogging your nose up with ****e LOL

Claudius

I know how it smells mate, I quit for several months this year and several years a few years ago. trust me, after you've been smoking, it's even worse! I could hardly bear the smell. I can see both sides of the story in comparison to people who have never smoked in their life, and that's why I'm trying to figure out a solution that works for both.

Smoking is such a trivial thing to fall out over...

logiclee

I've just come back from a Sunday roast carvery. The eating areas are non smoking but the pub was thick with smoke, I'll not be going back there again.
I mentioned this to the landlady and she said she would ban smoking straight away if the brewery would let them. She's confident that trade would improve as the smokers are mainly regulars who drink a few pints at dinner but families who would spend far more are put off by the smoke.

At my workplace smoking is totally banned on site and in some areas you are not allowed to have ****, lighters or matches on you. For most jobs there is no way you can go to a smoking area during shift.
It doesn't seem to bother anyone even on 12hour shifts, I just dont understand if they cant smoke for 12hours then sleep for 6 to 8 hours a day why they have to cram in 10-20 **** in the remaining 4 to 6 hours.

Lee

SCOSaltire

i dont smoke
i hate smoking
ive not been out to a pub / night out for fun for a few years.

Diesel

Claudius I really dont think smoking issues are 'trivial' - tell that to Roy Castle...

Splitting smokers and non smokers PROPERLY is the key. And by this I dont mean vacuum locks on doors between sections Star Trek style But then neither do I mean a £3 sign from Robert Dyas splitting the smoking section off! It's just about giving people proper choices - I actually blame the catering industry more than any 40 a day tabber for Benson and Hedging up my nippers fabric conditioned clobber!


D

Jerome

An interesting story about the effects of the smoking ban in Ireland here

"Irish publicans say a tobacco crackdown introduced in the Republic in March has led to a large fall in turnover."

logiclee

New York also experienced a drop in trade over the first 12 months but that steadily built back up and is now at an all time high.

The ban puts off smokers to start with but they eventually accept the ban. It also takes time to get non-smoking people like SCOSaltire who currently stay at home to start going out and enjoying the fresh air pubs again.

Yes there is a period of pain to go through for the liesure trade but it's well worth it. Restaurants and Cinema's put up all the same arguments but most of them are now smoke free and enjoying something of a trade boom.

Lee

Claudius

The whole debate is ridiculous. First, they start selling you cigarettes, then they advertise them, then they realise you can get lung cancer and other diseases from it, then they forbid the advertising for tobacco, then they forbid smoking in certain areas, and now they want to forbid it in pubs. It's like realising that you can have a car accident with a car and then forbidding driving on public roads.

Other than that, I agree about proper smoke extraction and separating the non smoking from the smoking areas, like I would think everybody would.

Oh, and I wouldnt take a baby to a smoky place, baby's lungs are very fragile.

Claudius

Interesting indeed.

I dont know the exact ins and outs, but I would guess that some people go to pubs precisely because they can have a cigarette and a drink there, especially people who are trying to cut down on the smoking and dont want to smoke at their home or workplace or in the car. Banning smoking in pubs leaves them the options of smoking on the street or sitting on a bench in a park. Not ideal in Ireland between October and March...

AndyC_772

iTrader: (2)

You'd also find that there are some people, like me, who don't drink in pubs precisely because they know they'll come home stinking like an ash tray. The health issues may be open for debate, but it's proven over and over again that cigarette smoke spoils an otherwise good night out for any non-smoker. Smoking is only socially acceptable amongst smokers.

Glad to hear it. But how dare you suggest by implication that my lungs, or anyone else's, are not too fragile to be subjected to cigarette smoke.

Claudius

I also hated smelling like smoke when I didnt smoke, and dont particularly like it now. That's why I said that there should be non smoking areas or non smoking pubs. Just saying that you shouldnt make a law that no one can smoke in any pub. Those are 2 different issues.

I never said smoking is good for your health or lungs. All I said is that people who smoke dont deserve to be excluded from an important social part of life for this reason.

Jaybird-UK

This is a thread thats going in no direction, smokers feel as strong as the non-smokers concerning pubs.

The fact is Ireland wasnt the first country to adopt this and wont be the last. Its inevitable the UK will go this way one day. You only have to look at the goverments stance on smoking and their health campaign.

logiclee

Who's excluding them??????

They can go out and have a drink and be social just as non smokers do.

If their addiction means they can't go without a *** for a few hours then they can go outside for a nicotine fix.

It's not a lot to ask, then the health of other drinkers and the pubs employees would not be affected and we can all go home without smelling like an ashtray.

Cheers
Lee