Is that the aroma of an imminently reconvening parliament I can smell, as the anti-tobacco crazies brew their wake up coffee in preparation for another term of propaganda peddling?
This one has been accurately fisked by England Expects, but why not shine some more light on the shifty machinations of one of the government's paid-for stooges, eh?
MPs urged to help put cigs out of sight
PEOPLE in North East England are calling on the region's MPs to vote in favour of putting cigarettes out of sight in shops.
Err ... no, PEOPLE are not. Ailsa Rutter, who sorts out her mortgage on the back of taxpayer-funded Department of Health grants, IS.
Ailsa Rutter, director of Fresh – Smoke Free North East, said: "This is not about penalising smokers."
Summer must have been good to Ailsa, she's cracking jokes now.
"This is about protecting them, not about restricting the rights of those smokers who don't want to quit."
To translate: This is about the fact that I've just come back from a lovely holiday in Antigua that you all paid for, and now I need to con MPs and the public before the upcoming commons third reading (just as ASH did to the Lords), so that I can book that fortnight in Hawaii for next year ... for which you are also stumping up. I've bought the grass skirt and everything.
Meanwhile, others have been performing some incredibly important, and in no way pre-determined, 'research'.
THE health burden from smoking is costing the Welsh NHS more than £7m a week, a report reveals today.
Oh. My. God. That's awful!
All those people smoking and destroying the NHS without ever contributing a penny in tobacco duty, income taxes, NI contributions, VAT, or anything. How on earth can they live with themselves?
Burning at the stake is too good for them.
The findings commissioned by anti-smoking group ASH Wales and British Heart Foundation Cymru, are being presented at an international tobacco control conference in Cardiff.
In other news, BP reported that gas powered cars cause all accidents in the UK, and Ryanair revealed new research showing that three kids riding tricycles in the park are more environmentally damaging than a dozen Boeings landing at Stansted.
Actually, I've had another sniff and I think my olfactory senses were misled. It's not the recall of parliament I can smell, but an avalanche of shrill, hysterical, tobacco control bullshit.
3 comments:
"British Heart Foundation Cymru, are being presented at an international tobacco control conference in Cardiff."
Oh dear Oh dear Oh dear
Another God forsaken Eistedffod of leek
sniffing ,sheep molesting choral Druids not
content with lobbing smooth handed village
idiots into sacred swamps,they are now after
ritual persecuton of Smoking Christians.
Why dont they go down their shut pits and
have a sing a long with Beelzebub
Reinforce Offas Dyke Campaign
Replies in English.Latin or German Please
Ok, so if no one smoked (according to them) NHS Wales would save £7m/week by not having to provide treatment for smoking related diseases. So far, so good - who could argue with that? But, is this an additional cost to any other for treating smokers for non smoking related illness? I thought that that lifetime healthcare costs for smokers was less than for non smokers. If so,if no one smoked NHS resources would be stretched even more and £10billion pounds duty (for all UK) would have to raised by other forms of taxation.
How about this? To avoid confusion as to where tobacco duty is apportioned, why not replace it with compulsory health insurance premium levied on all tobacco products?
2008 figures -
http://www.politics.co.uk/briefings-guides/issue-briefs/tobacco-duty-$1240025.htm
'Cigarettes - an amount equal to 22 per cent of the retail price plus £112.07 per thousand cigarettes; cigars - £163.22 per kilogram; hand-rolling tobacco - £117.32 per kilogram; other smoking tobacco and chewing tobacco - £71.76 per kilogram.'
I make that £650/20 a day smoker/annum.
Or, over, say 50 years - £32560 based on current figures.
And vat - maybe 75p a pack?
That would be another £270+/year (total £920/£46000.
Not forgetting tax paid on profits by BT (20p a pack?).
Probably a final fig of around £1000/year £50000/lifetime. I reckon a grand a year would buy 5 star insurance (only for smoking related diseases, of course).
What the fuck are they spending this money on?
Of course this is on top of NI, income tax and levies on other things.
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