Labour's smoking ban killed the British pub

[minestrone]

No, the comparison was made with local pubs as an important place for 'communities', not with Diageo.

Well the evidence is that they are not important as the 'communities' do not spend enough time in them to keep them going.

[d000hg]

Are you seriously comparing these non profit type of places to something the size of the drinks industry? Have you seen the profits Diagio make? Claiming tax breaks for pubs is laughable.

How is your local pub "the drinks industry"? And what difference does it make how much profit a pub chain makes, if they only keep open pubs which turn a profit? They're hardly going to say "well we make enough profit to keep a few pubs open that are losing money".

[Mich the Tester]

Well the evidence is that they are not important as the 'communities' do not spend enough time in them to keep them going.

No that's too simple. I'd say there are various categories of pubs that are struggling;

- tulip pubs that don't stand a chance anyway because they're run and frequented by disinterested old inbreds

- decent pubs that have been hit hard by successive things like smoking bans, raised alcohol duties, cheap supermarket booze and recession but could actually be sustained if they were cut a bit of slack

- tulip pubs that could become decent pubs if they were cut a bit of slack to make enough money to invest

Nobody's saying tulip pubs with tulip landlords should be saved, but either cutting the alcohol duties or possibly relaxing the smoking ban to accomodate alternatives like smoking rooms could give the willing landlords a bit of space to develop their businesses.

[Gittins Gal]

Lovely leap in logic there. The one thing you miss out is the current research on the purpose of sleep attached to ongoing research on Alzheimers and Parkinsons.

I'm merely pointing out that there are those who would like to socially engineer us into living our lives the way they see fit.

I find it sinister and illiberal.

And the way this health fascism is promulgated through the media these days seems to give some rather unpleasant individuals carte blanche to be very intolerant about people who do not chime with this puritanical zeitgeist.

We've all heard people complaining that fat people should pay for 2 seats haven't we? In fact, if I'm not mistaken, I'm pretty sure there have been cases of airlines charging overweight people for 2 seats.

Make the seats bigger perhaps? Anyhow, that's not the point. My point is that this is the thin end of a much thicker wedge, as I mentioned in my previous post, and I personally don't think I'm going to like the end game.

Why? Because I enjoy life and, to repeat myself, a little bit of naughtiness is good for the soul which in turn means it's good for the body.

[Sysman]

I've never really found anything to be 'militant' about. Am I missing out on something?

militant
adjective
favouring confrontational or violent methods in support of a political or social cause: the army are in conflict with militant groups.

Nope. don't think you're missing anything useful.

[Gittins Gal]

No that's too simple. I'd say there are various categories of pubs that are struggling;

- tulip pubs that don't stand a chance anyway because they're run and frequented by disinterested old inbreds

- decent pubs that have been hit hard by successive things like smoking bans, raised alcohol duties, cheap supermarket booze and recession but could actually be sustained if they were cut a bit of slack

- tulip pubs that could become decent pubs if they were cut a bit of slack to make enough money to invest

Nobody's saying tulip pubs with tulip landlords should be saved, but either cutting the alcohol duties or possibly relaxing the smoking ban to accomodate alternatives like smoking rooms could give the willing landlords a bit of space to develop their businesses.

Yes, all of this.

[minestrone]

Again we come back to "I want you to subsidise what I do even if you don't do it" which is not going to cut it with me nor with the treasury.

I don't see my local as the beating heart of the community and the real ale Midsommer Murders type pubs you all present as the average local with characters telling japes and helping the local area rarely exist.

Anyway, I suspect good pubs are doing better now after the smoking ban and bad pubs are doing worse.

[minestrone]

I'm merely pointing out that there are those who would like to socially engineer us into living our lives the way they see fit.

I find it sinister and illiberal.

Jesus fook love, you don't half do irony. You are the one wanting the government to modify tax to change people's behaviour.

[d000hg]

We've all heard people complaining that fat people should pay for 2 seats haven't we? In fact, if I'm not mistaken, I'm pretty sure there have been cases of airlines charging overweight people for 2 seats.
...
Because I enjoy life and, to repeat myself, a little bit of naughtiness is good for the soul which in turn means it's good for the body.

If you're too fat to fit - not fit easily but physically fit - in a regular seat then that's not because of "a little bit of naughtiness". Similarly if you like the odd cigarette/cigar, not being able to have one at the pub wouldn't stop you going.

[Mich the Tester]

Again we come back to "I want you to subsidise what I do even if you don't do it" which is not going to cut it with me nor with the treasury.

I don't see my local as the beating heart of the community and the real ale Midsommer Murders type pubs you all present as the average local with characters telling japes and helping the local area rarely exist.

Anyway, I suspect good pubs are doing better now after the smoking ban and bad pubs are doing worse.

Nobody's asking for a subsidy, but for reducing the taxes on booze and relaxing some of the legislation. It looks to me like rather leftist logic to call tax cuts a subsidy; 'ooh, look, we'll subsidize you by giving some of your own money back'.