Fibber Magee's breaking the smoking ban

Opting out

Hi XXXAnother PersonXXX,


"The solution to rainyday's health care problem is pretty simple. Give people the choice to opt out of the welfare state."

Of course it is, by the way can I opt out of the taxation system because I pay too much and while we're at it, can I also opt out of the justice system so that I can beat the living carp out of those smokers next time I see them lighting up in the pub/street/own homes etc etc..?

Could you just THINK about what you said in your email?

Jeez! :rolleyes

OpusnBill
 
Re: Opting out

The solution to rainyday's health care problem is pretty simple. Give people the choice to opt out of the welfare state.
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Doesn't work that way. What's going to happen when the smoker is coughing up his cancerous lungs on the hospital doorstep - Do you really think he will be refused entry?
 
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> The solution to rainyday's health care problem is pretty simple. Give people the choice to opt out of the welfare state.

I can see it now - XXXAnother PersonXXX stocking up on tins of beans and AK-47s and heading to the Wicklah hills Michigan Militia style to hole up until Armageddon! :lol
 
Smoking causes cancer

Passive smoking causes cancer and other health problems

There was a case taken by a pub worker in Australia who sued for passive smoking damage and won her case

Let publicans open smoking pubs, if they are willing to sign a document stating that their non-smoking staff can sue them if they do contract any passive smoking diseases
 
Going back to the point about it being a personal choice for a construction worker to wear a hardhat or a motorist to wear a seatbelt. I don't agree with this. What if a worker decides not to wear a hardhat and a block falls on him. Lets say he is working on a scaffold with a colleague at the time and knocks his colleague off the scaffold. Same thing with seatbelts. If a motorist fails to wear a seatbelt he is not just endangering himself. If a backseat passenger is not belted in and a crash occurs the passenger may harm the driver. As on the TV ad. These rules and regulations are not just put in place for the safety of the individual. They are put in place for the safety of all those involved in a possible accident. Personal choice is ok to a point but when the health of others is involved a line must be drawn.

Therefore I don't see any issue with the smoking ban. Shnaek said it should not be as simple as a black or white ban, i.e ban it or allow it. But it is this simple. People are entitled to a safe working environment and if that means customers have to do without their cigarette/cigar/pipe while having a pint or carrying out any other kind of business well then so be it.
 
People are indeed entitled to a safe working environment, but if you own a small bar and you are a smoker and you allow people to smoke I cannot see the problem here. There are very few black and white issues in life as I see it.
 
People are indeed entitled to a safe working environment, but if you own a small bar and you are a smoker and you allow people to smoke I cannot see the problem here.
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Thats all very well until you take a week off for a holiday / get sick even and hire someone in to look after the bar for you. Your premises now becomes a workplace, so do you enforce the law just for this week.
 
you allow people to smoke I cannot see the problem here.
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You may not see the problem, but the delivery guy who has to enter your bar for deliveries might see a problem, and the environmental health officer who has to enter your bar for inspections might see a problem, and the electrician/plumber who has to maintain the equipment in your bar might see a problem etc etc.
 
IMHO

The smoking ban and indeed the penalty points system are a ploy to make it look like the government are taking action on health and road deaths. There is no imagination in either policy simply the 'stick' approach. Clearly in the face of breaking the election promise to clear hospital waiting lists within two years they had to come up with something which was inexpensive and would occupy the public and more importantly the media and take the focus off the huge waiting lists. It has worked brilliantly in this regard.

The health system is crazy . . workers are forced to pay a 2% health levy toward the public health system but as the system is rubbish most workers also pay private health insurance (the majority VHI, also state owned). The private health insurers rent beds from the public funded hospitals and because there is a huge waiting list on the public side the treatment purchase fund (tax payers again) rents beds from the private hospitals. On top of this tax payers money has been going to subsidize the building of private hospitals. Is it just me or is this a system which could only be developed in Ireland?

On the penalty points side the state don't really care about road deaths. If they did they would reduce VRT so that base car models would be better equipped re safety as the current situation is that many safety features are left out of cars for the Irish market to keep down the price. I don't thing anyone (maybe one person) has been put of the road but it has certainly generated a lot of revenue for the state. In fairness given that most fatal accidents happen at the weekend, at night on back roads, the points system which is enforced on nice sunny days on major carriageways possibly has no effect on road death figures.

A few years ago while sitting at lights a Garda knocked on my car window and told me that both my brake lights were out. He said they probably blew applying the brakes while going over a bump. Makes sense. I thanked him and replaced the bulbs that day. If the same thing happened today I would receive 4 points (I think it's 4) and a fine taking up Garda time and starting a needless paper trail. Is the points approach in this case making the roads any safer? Even if you check all your lights every time you get in your car you can not be certain that a bulb won't blow en-route and then even the most compliant citizen could get the points but not the point.

END
 
Shouldn't we have mandatory sprinkler systems introduced in every pub as part of their licence renewal ?

This way, inconsiderate smokers would result in the whole place getting a nice soaking. I don't think too many people would visit errant pubs if they knew they were likely to get a free shower !!!

;)
 
The smoking ban and indeed the penalty points system are a ploy to make it look like the government are taking action on health and road deaths.

The issue of penalty points aside (a lot of which I'd agree with you) and even putting aside this governments failings on health...the ban on smoking will eventually result in a fall off in the number of young smokers thus alleviating problems with cancer sufferers in years to come.

The net overall result is a health benefit.
 
Fire Insurance, Public Liability and Illegal Activity

Noel,

This is interesting, Is fibber magee's fire insurance invalid if the owners permit illegal activity involving lighting paper and leaves?

ajapale
 
Hi MichaelM - THe penalty points system is nothing to do with money. It runs alongside and in addition to the existing system of fines. It does not raise additional revenue.

While I share many of your concerns about the health service, I don't see the relevance of this to the debate on the smoking ban. It's not as if Martin was facing a choice of either the smoking ban or reduced waiting lists. The ban proceeded because of its own merit, and is probably the one positive thing this Govt has done in 8 years.
 
What the penalty points or hospital waiting lists have to do with the smoking ban, I don't know. I think people bring in these issues to distort the facts and the argument.

The smoking ban is good for me. It is good for you.
Smokers are inconvienced by it, but surely if this means that some of them will give up or cut back, then it is a good thing.

How many people who are against this ban would like to bring back the days where people could smoke on the bus, in the cinema or even at their desks in work?

I find it hypocritical anyone who says that we should not be allowed to smoke in these places, but yet still smoke in the pub.

I, like most people here have spent a lot of time in the pub over my life, and I know that no matter how good any ventilation system is, it does nothing when the person at the table next to you blows their smoke towards you.
I don't think too much about the health consequences, but I do get really peed off with the arrogance that someone can do that and think nothing of it. Like someone belching towards me and they have been eating garlic.

I don't care about the bar workers or their health, I care about myself (like almost everyone else) and I want to be able to go out in a smoke free environment.
 
I think the point being made on the penalty points and hospital waiting lists was to with the suspicion that these were easy things to bring in and keep people distracted when the real issues regarding health is the state of our health system and regarding road safety is the state of our roads. Bringing in these sort of measures helps a government that is unable to make hard decisions.

I agree with many of the points made above. I far prefer going to the pub as it is now - smoke free. I love waking up in the morning without the smell of smoke on my clothes. But the plight of the minority must be considered and I would always seek to accomodate them if the means were there to do that without damaging the health/safety etc. of the majority.
 
While I share many of your concerns about the health service, I don't see the relevance of this to the debate on the smoking ban.
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Hi rainyday - I was expressing my opinion that the motivation for the smoking ban had less to do with workers health (not applied to all work places) and was more intended as smoke screen for our ruins of a health system. They should put €3 on a pack or 20 and direct it to cancer research but they are afraid of the effect on the consumer price index.

What the penalty points or hospital waiting lists have to do with the smoking ban, I don't know. I think people bring in these issues to distort the facts and the argument.
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Hi Maceface - I have made no attempt to distort anything. The thread has meandered somewhat and some of my comments may have been off the original subject line but if you were following the thread you wouldn't be put off by this.

I am a non-smoker so this ban suits me however I am just concerned at the trend of the state trying to micromanage peoples lives and bombarding us with warning of penalties over the smoking ban, penalty points, TV licence etc. The justice minister continues to give more powers to the Gardai despite the fact that they don't use many of the powers they already have. I just see personal freedoms starting to slip away.

I accept that I may have a minority opinion but this is the 'Letting Off Steam' section isn't it? ah . . I feel much better now.
 
The big American tobacco companies must be looking on at the success of the smoking ban in lil ol' Ireland with a great degree of alarm. If it works here, then it'll roll out across the rest of Europe.

I wonder if they're funding any of this campaign ?
 
Noel,

Another interesting observation!

Have you noticed the timing of the more recent 'revolts' correlates more closely with events in the UK than here in Ireland?

Has anyone sought to challenge the publicans when they say that business is down X%? These anecdotal figures are reported worldwide as if fact. Check out 'Google news' and see. The publicans should be challenged hard and fast when they make these unsubstantiated assertions.

Did anyone notice the 'so-called' independent survey carried out by "Behaviour and Attitudes" last week? Who commissioned the survey by this reputable firm? What were the questions asked? Are the results and methodology published in a public forum?

Finally, pick any political issue and ask people whether they support 'compromise' you will nearly always get a majority to agree. The so-called 'pro-compromise' view is a spurious argument.

Any comments on whether publicans in breach of the smoking regulations have invalid fire and public liability insurance? If publicans broke the law by adulterating drink with say 'anti-freeze' to improve profits I suspect their public liability insurance would be invalid. However I might be wrong.

Yes Big Tobacco have some Big Brains working on this one.

ajapale
 
Some interesting updates from [broken link removed] regarding the impacts of the smoking ban in New York;

• The city’s health authorities have found that air samples showed a six-fold reduction in air pollution levels in establishments, which previously allowed smoking.
• A nicotine by-product, which is used to determine exposure to second-hand smoke in bar workers was found to have reduced by 85 percent.
• Employment in restaurants and bars has increased by 10,600 jobs. Business and tax receipts in restaurants and bars are up almost ten percent.
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