A Tangled Web

'Tobacocracy'



Do you like my newly invented word? It applies to government panjandrums in different parts of the world who think it is perfectly acceptable to deny people the right to smoke in designated public places. For example, Scotland's First Minister, Jack McConnell, is considering a ban north of the border following his positive impression on the effects of the ban in the Irish Republic. To illustrate the utter stupidity of banning smoking in public, let me give you a recent example.



America's Environmental Protection Agency says that a car is the single most polluting thing most of us own. In many urban areas, motor vehicles are the single biggest contributor to ground level ozone - a chief component of smog. Nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons, carbon dioxide, benzene and carbon monoxide are all produced in copious quantities by cars. Are you following so far? Good! Now we turn to the situation as it exists in New York City. I have a friend who has just returned from a visit to the States. He told me that a rigorous smoking ban exists in New York and, as a smoker, he found it difficult to light up in so many places.



I am no expert on American statistics but what I do know is that the Big Apple in the biggest city in Uncle Sam - with a population of around 8 million people. A further 4 million live in the greater metropolitan area: towns such as Oyster Bay, Yonkers, Levittown, Brentwood, Hicksville, etc. In the five boroughs of New York alone, 47% of the people own at least one car; in the more affluent areas of Long Island the figure is bound to be higher. Thus, we have all those cars pumping out all that pollution, yet the NY authorities implement a smoking ban on the grounds of health considerations!



As an ex-smoker I have no qualms about people who wish to light up in public. I do have concerns about politicians slowly eroding away the liberties of people by invoking spurious claims about the effects of passive smoking. If the Irish and the Americans wish to have an authoritarian stance on people's right to smoke, so be it. I don't see why such draconian measures need to be emulated here in the United Kingdom.