This new smoking law……..

Is it definitely coming into force or they're still discussing it?

 

I’m generally against any overzealous government intervention, I do not want a nanny state.

However, I don’t see many drawbacks to this. Other than revenue loss, which is quite significant. The counter would be the saving to the nhs but I’m not sure one thing balances the other. I’m more in the ‘legalise everything and whack tax and duty on it’ camp. That isn’t realistic though and as such I’m not against this.

Though it does mean tobacco will still be available to buy, for progressively fewer and fewer people, for another 80 years or so. I wonder what that will look like in the coming decades as local shops won’t bother stocking them once the market drops, and will it be a special licence product with mandatory ID checks?

To be honest given there are alternative nicotine products to assist habitual smokers with addiction, there’s no huge reason to carry on selling tobacco at all - but that would be argued to be an intervention too far for people who have already made that lifestyle choice.

 

Was in the King’s speech yesterday

 

Tories will be out before it's in place, but Labour have already said they wouldn't oppose this, so I'd expect it to go ahead.

 

TBH, to make it work they need to remove the duty free status on imported tobacco and tobacco goods. Set it to the same tax as from the shops, and give a large fine to anyone caught smuggling. Far too much is available under the counter.

 

To be honest you hardly see teenagers smoking at all now. Probably the facts that it's very smelly and prohibitively expensive have contributed to that. However, it seems to have largely replaced with vaping, the consequences of which are only likely to become understood many years from now.

 

Can see vaping becoming just as bad if not worse. I would have banned vapes before tobacco.

 

I think you may well be right about the health effects, but I have serious doubts that banning vapes is the way forward.

I have no idea what the levels of regulation and quality control are right now, but banning them would run the risk of poor quality or adulterated products appearing on the black market.

Banning recreational drugs has been a full-on unmitigated disaster. Instead of reducing harm, it's largely led to inadvertent overdoses and poisonings as people have no idea what they're consuming or in what purity. I'd expect something similar to happen if vapes were pushed underground.

 

I'm generally in favour, vapes should be included now, but if not the minimum should be the removal of sweet and fruit flavours and packaging styles that are specifically designed to hook children.

 

With proper regulation it would be much better than the situation now. I'm guessing that it would be the pharmaceutical companies who would be involved, as they already produce these substances to medical grade; when research is done on the effects of these substances, the professors don't go and buy them on a street corner!

I'm not for a minute suggesting that all of a sudden the world would be some sort of psychedelic utopia, but I still think that ravers dancing on ecstasy tablets made by Pfizer, with a very accurate dosage of pure MDMA, are far likely to be safe than the current lot, whose pills are made by Johann in his kitchen in Rotterdam, who got halfway through his chemistry degree, before being bought and distributed by a criminal gang who pay no taxes and are probably involved in other unsavoury businesses such as people trafficking and arms running. The tablets that end up in the club might be what people think they are, might be something chemically related but not exactly the same, and they also might have been crushed up and mixed with anything from brick dust to dog worming tablets. In any case, the dosage is absolutely unknown.

It's all very well governments telling people "just say no" but at the end of the day, people enjoy getting spannered, whether that's on booze or other substances. The message is especially hollow now, bearing in mind a certain Mr M Gove's well-known fondness for Colombian nose beer.

 

Only we already know vaping is not as dangerous as smoking…

Whilst there aren’t the decades of usage evidence to go on, and so some of this is to be fair hypothesised; the science is pretty sound in the conclusion drawn that vapes and e-cigs are much less harmful (estimated at 95% less harmful based on the absence of carcinogens compared to tobacco smoke).

Interested agencies who publicly advocate the switch to e-cigs/vapes from smoking (only for existing smokers) include both the NHS and Cancer Research U.K. Neither would nail their cap to the mast if they thought there was any chance of their advice being wrong.

I don’t see why they haven’t banned these in the same manner with a rolling age range though. Avoid anyone being addicted at all (in theory) for the future generations. Makes you wonder if there’s going to be a change in the duty approach to vapes - the government has said they won’t apply duty so as to keep the price low enough to make them attractive to smokers as an alternative. I suspect once there’s less smokers they might target the nicotine addicted to fill the coffers with a new duty.

 

30 years ago now, a friend of ours unfortunately developed an heroin addiction. Along with some others, they moved to a flat in Sheffield where it got out of control and he was found in a car park having had a fit bad enough for the police to initially suspect he'd had a kicking. He was barely 20 years old and the fatal fit was caused by what the heroin had been cut with.

Only 2 years ago, a friend of our daughters was found dead in his flat after a ketamine overdose. He also struggled with addiction and was barely 20.

Even after that, I'm convinced that legalizing drugs would be far better than continuing to ban them.

If the drugs were mass-produced by the pharmaceutical companies to a high standard without impurities, it is very likely that one of them would still be alive - possibly both. It would also destroy the drug gangs entire business model and reduce violence in most Western countries and free up a lot of prison space for those who deserve it. Any tax revenue could be used to fund treatment for those who need help.

RIP Fletch and Joe.