Smoking rooms
Damien Hockney wants to see the smoking ban amended so people can light up in designated rooms. The BBC has the story. His argument that the legislation is "destroying bohemia" is amusing, but I do have a scintilla of sympathy with his view.
Just two years after the ban was put in place, it's already become strange to see people smoking indoors in old TV programmes and films. And look at the photos that won this website's photo competitions in 2007 and in 2008 -both depicted typical pub scenes, complete with wisps of smoke rising from cigarettes. Indeed, on the night before the ban came into place, I toked on a pipe myself in a pub in rural Oxfordshire.
Nostalgia aside, I think the smoking ban's a good thing. If anything, it helps good pubs to attract the right sort of customers. I know lots of people who rarely visited pubs before the ban - my parents, for example - but who now feel more comfortable doing so. Smokers with manners hardly want to inflict their habit on others in a confined space, after all.
20 comments:
My little local used to be foggy with tab smoke and I feared the worst. Happily though it has never been busier, the punters having packed the fags in or cut down dramatically.
The gaffer sticks to traditional hours and continues with w/e lock-ins. The ash trays come out when the doors are locked.
My partner used to HATE going to pubs with the smoke. Certainly I also appreciate no longer smelling like an ashtray after a night out. I've no problem with smokers
"Smokers with manners" aren't the problem.
Many's a time I sat in a boozer with the good lady trying to enjoy some sort of faux-gastro shite washed down with a pint of the guest ale. The instant the plates were delivered to the table, the World Smoking Championships kicked off about three feet to our left.
Not to mention the obligatory girl at the table with the non-smoking mates who would blow her smoke over her shoulder right into the faces a family with asthmatic toddlers in high-chairs and a half-demented rescued beagle from Huntingdon Life Sciences wearing a Nicorette collar....
Drinking in Tourney last week, contemplating a beautiful glass of De Ranke’s Guldenberg, then a waft of fag juice spills onto my space, forget that it’s not banned in Wallonia — took me right back to the time when clothes smelt of spent tobacco and some ned would often blow a gust of baccy right across my bows. No problems with the ban and I often join the smokers at my local for a chat outside these days, but I do wonder if smoking rooms might have been a half decent halfway house, bit like exempt hunting.
Fatman said "The gaffer sticks to traditional hours and continues with w/e lock-ins. The ash trays come out when the doors are locked."
I just don't get landlords who have lock-ins. Don't they have homes to go to? After a long day and evening, I want to be offski at half eleven, to relax on my own sofa. Nor do I get the customers who want to hang around when everyone else has moved on. Who wants to be in a near empty pub? I always tell people who want to keep drinking to go on to a bar or club. Fortunately, there are plenty in the area.
I too think that the smoking ban is a good thing. But surely there is room for a little bit of compromise?
The problem with any form of compromise is that it undermines the primary objective of the legislation: the protection of employees in the workplace.
Arguments as to whether it's fair to say that employees can simply go and work somewhere else if they don't like it were played out the last time we discussed this on this blog.
it's already become strange to see people smoking indoors
It was June 2004 and I'd just got off the train at Paddington to see someone on the platform smoking. Even though it was only three months since the smoking ban had kicked in at home I was flabbergasted to see someone smoking indoors in a public building.
Funny how quick things like this become second nature. You'll find it's the same with the euro when you see sense on that one too.
The most interesting is that the smoking ban seems to be working well in Italy. It's just about the only law they bother to respect.
A comment from an Irishman about Britain, then one from a Norwegian about Italy. This is like Eldorado. I bagsy being Marcus Tandy.
Although the smoking ban hasn't resulted in me going to pubs more often, my wife is now much happier about going to pubs. Before the ban I could only tempt her into the odd pub that was non-smoking (eg New Inn, Salisbury) or one with an effective non-smoking area.
It is also good not to have your clothes smelling like an ashtray after a night out...
Here in the States, I'm quite happy to visit non-smoking establishments.
Some places like NYC recently enacted a smoking ban and I think people were initially worried about business, but it does not seem to have scared anyone off.
Still, I think the owner of the establishment should have the right to decide and not have it forces upon him.
If employers could choose not to ban smoking in their premises, how would employees be effectively protected? The point of the ban is that it protects employees in enclosed workplaces.
Surely this battle is over, our pubs our cleaner, and for weak part-time rollup blaggers like me, our only temptation is another beer before homeski. Bar staff everywhere keep smiling and rejoice; if you're happy we are happy.....
I very rarely go in pubs, but when I do they are far nicer now the smokers are banished. The issue is over. Isn't it now time to start banning the people with tattoos?
At the risk of finding out that I'm clearly not part of some übercool in-joke who the bloody hell's Damien Hockney?
Jeff, we had a late one on Saturday, and I think that had you been here you would have loved it. My girlfriend and Kellie were both dancing on the bar, I think to the music of Nena and '99 red balloons'. I made a jug of my favourite summer drink, It was loads of fun. It was like taking all the good parts of a club to a decent pub.
(I still don't let anyone smoke inside though, they have to squeeze into the tiny back yard. Ha !)
knutalbert said:
"The most interesting is that the smoking ban seems to be working well in Italy. It's just about the only law they bother to respect".
During a conversation, I mentioned to an Italian friend how surprised I was, that the country had respected the smoking ban. Smiling, he told me that Italians understood that politicians like to legislate and instead of kicking against it, they simply find ways of circumnavigating laws after they have been introduced. The British on the other hand, seem perplexed that politicians like to wield power and kick against it. Until that is, the law is passed, then they meekly fall into line and tug their forelocks.
It's a thought...
Smoking responsibly should be the motto of every smoker. Most responsible cigar lovers would agree. A lot of them love to search up Cigars online and then perhaps chat up about it on the internet. Discussing various kinds of cigars can be a great talking point indeed.
The problem with any form of compromise is that it undermines the primary objective of the legislation: the protection of employees in the workplace.
I think that's why there's still a few small German bars with smoking rooms - the way it was explained to me was that if it's an owner-operated bar and you don't have any staff (or maybe your staff don't go in there), you can have a smoking room. The smoke still drifts though.
My heart now sinks on the - fortunately increasingly rare - occasions when I'm travelling, and realise that the country I've just arrived in still allows smoking indoors in public places.
Post a Comment