Cross-channel shopping update
Monday, November 28, 2011 at 9:01 When I wrote about the latest hike in tobacco duty in March it provoked a heated discussion about cross-Channel shopping.
I later returned to the subject here: Government cuts tobacco guidelines.
Yesterday we received an email that is worth sharing because it highlights a problem that many people may encounter:
A friend recently drove to Belgium with three colleagues on one of their twice yearly visits to purchase hand rolling tobacco. Nothing was said on his way out of the country and it was not until they returned with their prescribed three kilos that they learnt that the restrictions on the amount of cigarettes and hand rolling tobacco had been reduced.
HMRC asked them a lot of questions, said they would allow them to pass this time but in future the limit had been reduced to one kilo each although HMRC did add that this was only a guideline.
Imagine my friend's horror when he returned home and checked out the HMRC website and found so much misinformation that he is very confused.
Imagine reading on one page that there are not any restrictions on what you can bring into the country as long as it is for personal use. Then on the next page the list of what you can bring through customs according to HMRC – just 800 cigarettes (pre 1/10/2011 = 3200) or one kilo of hand rolling tobacco (was three kilos). There is no change on the amount of alcohol you can bring in (guidelines).
Continuing to read he found that if you try to bring in more than the guidelines and cannot give satisfactory answers to questions such as who is this for, how often do you go abroad etc you are liable to confiscation of the tobacco/cigarettes and guess what – your car/vehicle taken as well. I thought this had been resolved in a court case back in 2004.
Is it my imagination or are the government targeting smokers yet again?
The email was timely because on Saturday The Times published an article headlined 'How to keep hold of your duty-frees'.
The article is behind The Times' paywall but it includes a quote from Nothing-2-Declare (who posts about it here) and is worth reading.
Reader Comments (141)
@ DD
Resorting to insults and lies shows reveals your true petty mind. Nowhere does N2D claim it will beat the UKBA. What their latest info does is create a level playing field when interviewed by UKBA. Only an idiot or liar would say this is small stuff and you just have. N2D asked for no funding, links or the credit for getting this info out. All they requested was get the message out.
Oddballs they certainly are. Who else would take on the UKBA full frontal with no regard for the consequences of their actions? Definitely not you and your fine feathered friends. Your actions do indeed tell a lot, but about you not N2D.
Throughout history oddballs have invariably made a difference. You and your kind then claim the laurels - after the battle has been won.
@DD
Remind me of the last time you and your find feathered friends did anything about x-border shoppers? Apart from the 7 years out of date advice, that is. The only other site l know of that does, is Daytripper but no doubt you'll say he is an oddball too.
N2D, with their crew of "oddballs" have accumulated a lot of solid experience. They have learned how to avoid UKBA's limited repertoire of cheap and dirty tricks.
N2D wants this valuable knowledge to be diseminated widely.
The EU is fundamentally about free trade. All citizens must be free to shop around within the union.
The British Government wants to be in the EU. It taxes tobacco so heavily that consumers take their trade elsewhere.
The solution? Turn a blind eye to UKBA's disgraceful behaviour. They actively encourage UKBA to mug cross-border shoppers. They call it "disruption".
But the law is the law. If ordinary shoppers are prepared, they are much less likely to be robbed.
N2D wants the message to go out from the more respectable sites. SH doesn't want credit, just results.
The N2D advice is thoroughly tested, and it's very, very effective. It's as simple as that.
Pass it on, please.
feathered friends???
i think you will find n2d boasts of winning against ukba and not losing, you know the stats and all that...beat ukba bullies is the story so stop making silly claims thats not what they are about
i agree recording does level the playing field but only against bullies, of course this where the real lies kick in and you nick repeat them parrot fashion that ukba rob 80,000 , they are thieves without a mention the vast majority must surely be a fair cop especially when the rules are easily broken by innocent shoppers without knowing it.
i agree nobody does anything about x border shoppers ...why is that ? becasue no-one cares, not even sympathetic freedom fighters and when the balance gets slanted to the degree n2d does he just gets ignored.
what does mr day-tripper do?...plenty of adverts and where you get a bit of nice cheese and choccy in calais and a bit of noise about ukba to cover every angle about x-border shoppers and shopping.
the problem is that around 11 years has passed since crackdown and no-one gives a toss , probably because the difference between normal thinking reasonable balanced individuals who travel and have had dealings with customs and those with a grudge and a score to settle is vast.
and of course the sight of customs officers stopping drug smugglers and criminals is a welcome sight at the border...oh god more shocking balance.
there is help and advice and n2d chucks some good stuff , trouble is that nobody wants to hear about it and wont believe 80,000 seizures were unlawfully robbed or victims and all that tosh.
how can you get credibilty without balance...the good stuff can't then be trusted
@DD
It's you that are doing the slanting. N2D puts up stats (official) that say 70-80,000 people per year have theit goods seized and less than 1% appeal. Even you should be able to see something is glaringly wrong with that. N2D doesn't say that all theses seizures are wrong but it's obvious to a blind man that many are.
No-one cares you say but N2D do and the many people who have their lives damaged. Yes N2D do put up their victories and back it up with facts. They also put up the losses people have incurred. l'd call that balanced.
Your agenda is perfectly clear, your intention is to try and destroy the credibility of N2D but without facts to back them up.
lncidentally N2D are approx 1 million places above Forest in web rankings despite Forest's £250k + funding per year
"and you nick repeat them parrot fashion that ukba rob 80,000 , they are thieves without a mention the vast majority must surely be a fair cop especially when the rules are easily broken by innocent shoppers without knowing it." -DD
Actually DD the UKBA make little secret out of the fact that most of the seizures are unjustified and that it is a deliberate intimidation tatic (along with seizing people's cars). That's made clear in their own guidance which SH has published...phrases (off the top of my head) like 'the assumption must be for seizure'. They have clear directives from the government to do this-again published and freely available on the intrawebz.
Have you never wondered why they never offer your shoppers who 'innocently break the rules' (and there are infact no rules to break-except bringing it back for a commercial purpose) the chance to simply pay the supposedly missing duty and keep their goods -as always used to be the practice under the HMRC?
nick please look at zaphods post above, who shares the same pee pot as smoking hot and his other posts in the thread, and this from smoking hot
"Despite 70-80,000 people suffering at the hands of UKBA per year"
and also his view about ukba from his blog:
"we've seen the standard of staff along with integrity and honesty get lower and lower. We are now left with the UKBA who are totally out of control, secretive, dishonest, bullying etc etc."
its not just me who sees the lack of credibilty its all them others too who cant even shove a link up or write a few lines, even the times did a hatchet job on his bit to them so it sounded like a ukba press release.
@sbc the rules about no payment in kind and purchasing them for others for no profit are the innocent ones ,
the bit about ukba make no secret etc is slanting like a good un
like i said no truthfull balance means lack of trust and confidence to promote the cause from within the club of blogs/sites and leaves shoppers doubting everything else...which they shouldn't do
I think it's becoming clear that DD just dislikes SH.
DD, you're foaming at the mouth. Calm down, dear. You're incoherent.
"sbc the rules about no payment in kind and purchasing them for others for no profit are the innocent ones" -DD
Those actually fall under the UKBA's defintion of 'commerciality'..whatever that actually is or as I correctly said 'commercial purpose'.
Slanted? Nope...like i said its all in the public domain.
Truthful balance? Unfortunately the UKBA have been shown to be the ones with the endemic culture of dishonesty time and time again...even their own appeals tribunal have declared it or as the 'judge' put it "the absurdity of this reasoning is demonstrated simply by stating it" which is pretty damning.
Ignore SH's, Zaphod's and my own windmill-tilting invective if it annoys you and just read the documentary evidence....it's enough to convince even the most skeptical that there is something foul in Dover...
Reading even just "ANNEX B-
PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENT
between
THE COMMISSIONERS OF
HM REVENUE & CUSTOMS
and
THE HOME OFFICE
on Interim Arrangements and Frontier Delivery
Requirements for the
UK Border Agency in 2008-09" and understanding how the government defines words like 'illict tobacco' should make any reasoned balanced person's blood run cold...even if they aren't a smoker.
I have been having a think about 'the guidelines'.
For a person who smokes 5 cigarettes a day, 800 fags will last for 160 days - almost 6 months. For a person like me, who smokes 40 a day, 800 will last 20 days. And so it is clear that the guidelines will have some relevance to the consumption of some people but not much for others - everyone is different. This thinking led me to understand better what the guidelines are for. They are not really addressed to the people, they are addressed to customs officers. Their 'raison d'etre' is to authorise customs officers to interrogate people. Quite a clever ruse, doncha think?
As regards SH's SoT, he clearly says that you should amend it as you think fit. The important thing about it is that it helps people to know what the important topics it covers are.
Oh....and another thing about the guidelines.
For a person going on a legitimate shopping trip in the EU, the only intelligent thing to do is to buy in bulk. This means considerable financial outlay. I therefore think that an important part of the process is to be able to show that you have the funds and that they are your own funds. I will therefore take with me a statement of my main savings account going back several years.
Junican, proof of 'being able to afford to go shopping abroad' is a vital part of the SOT. Too many people have had their goods seized because they were on benefits or a pension....and therefore in the eyes of the UKBA MUST have been 'smuggling'.
My last SOT included not only a current bank statement but also a signed written statement from the friends who had made me a private loan and that they were not in anyway using me as an agent etc....and even bank statements from the time just after my previous trip showing the debit card deductions for the tobacco purchased in the BNL.
I wasn't joking when i said my SOT is half an inch thick..http://2khh4.blogspot.com/2011/12/pic-link.html (file at back)
Casual readers will wonder if all this is necessary.
It's hard to convince them of the outrageous injustice that is happening at the border.
While battling successfully at the customs lair, I have often seen stunned ordinary people around me being summarily relieved of their small amounts of lawful property.
This is what keeps me angry. Angry at the perpetrators and also at their apologists.
l can vouch for N2D 100%. When l had my tobacco seized l tried to find a solicitor but couldn't find one to take my case. Many of them told me to forget it because they said l could not win and l'd be liable for costs too. l then came across N2D and they helped me with my appeal. My initial appeal was rejected but N2D took apart their reasons for seizure and appealed again. l won and N2D didn't charge me a penny for their work.
http://nothing-2-declare.blogspot.com/2011/06/appeal-against-seizure-won.html
Did I miss something? ;)
Dickie: "it was like a 24 hour drain on revenue,a production line"
And why is this a problem? The entire point of a European free market is that EU citizens should be allowed to shop around the, you know, free market.
Survival of the fittest. It should show up UK duty rates to be unsustainable and therefore to be adjusted accordingly. The response entirely negates the point of EU free borders and so shows the EU up to be a sham. Either that, or the UK authorities just want everything their own way.
It should quite rightly be a flood inward. Only when the market corrects itself (by the UK government admitting they're wrong) is the 'problem' going to abate. The fact that they won't contemplate that is laughable. Has anyone in Westminster or UKBA ever heard of the Laffer Curve?
I had the same thought, DP. But I would go further.
The UK Government is quite happy that people from other countries enter the UK to shop in London at Harrods, etc. Presumably, these people do so because they reckon that they get a better deal in London than they do in their own countries - we have seen this in respect of various commodities which cost less in the USA than they do in the UK.
'Swings and roundabouts' suggest that the emphasis on tobacco and alcohol is misplaced since many other commodities are subject to the same cost imperative. In 'reality', duty as such has little to do with it - the 'reality' is cost.
Simon should move on from Forest and let someone with drive and new ideas take the reins. To all intents and purposes Forest is on life support. Thompson's e-petition is an embarrassment and does more damage than good. Leaving it in such a prominent position is a marketing disaster. Give it's place to something positive for god's sake, something like one of the prominent stars who smokes, makes an issue of it and gets massive coverage. There's no shortage of choice.
Simon's more at ease with Taking Liberties, his time as director of Forest is over. The site has become completely ineffectual, boring and out of touch. lt needs life breathing into it.
@dick puddlecote the problem was the large scale criminality that millions took part in because of a virtual free for all.
the answer is lower taxes on fags and shove the lost revenue onto another tax.stops criminals and unfair cigs tax
@zaphod ,i agree casual readers will be hard to convince of problems at the borders which do exist...unfortunately your repeated extreme rants that paints ukba as corrupt and thieves with no balance is part of the problem
its not my opinion only, its the complete lack of interest of the problem ( over11 years )despite the internet and blogging and even freedom liberty mongers don't want to know, and an unbalanced view with suspect hype over advice just makes N2D appear naff, and of course your average traveller just dosent recognise the problems in the first place
there is a reason its gone under the publics radar and been ignored!!, its because the truth is nearer the no problem end of the scale than ukba nearly all thieves and corruption angle that N2D claim
and when you produce a legal document lookalike and use words like ididots and accusing ukba of harrasment and ranting on it just looks like a loony with a chip on his shoulder.
Double Dick
Youre the only thing thats unbalanced. 'No problem' with Ukba eh? Wake up and smell the coffee ffs Have you experienced a UKBA welcome back to UK if you've bought baccy over their limit, sorry guidelines. Tell my mates elderly parents that who got 8kg of baccy seized along with their car and left them stranded 300 miles from home. Tell his dad that who was made to sign the Ukbas notebook even when he can't read or write. Tell that to his parents when they were kept separate in cold rooms for hours and even refused a drink of water .Tell that to his parents when they asked how they were to get home and just laughed at.
Tell you what just fuck off arsehole You make me puke.
"and when you produce a legal document lookalik"-DD
Sorry DD but there you are wrong. Nothing 'lookalike' about it. An SOT is a valid 'legal document' for many courts and is used by the UKBA themselves in giving evidence to the Tribunal.
For example:
http://www.compactlaw.co.uk/free-legal-information/small-claims-court/statement-of-truth.html
@tommy. its not no problem at all, and nor is it all thieves and corruption and 80,000 dodgy seizures either,
there is a balance between ignorant shoppers and those grey area shoppers who think a little bit of dodgy business is ok and honest travellers who get caught out, and outright smugglers, one things for sure the outrage and disgust about ukba is felt by everyone.
once you tar nearly all ukba as corrupt and all shoppers as victims then you lose the plot and seem like a loony with a grudge.
@sbc ok a pukka legal document, which is more reason for idiots and the rant designed to wind up ukba to be left out.
silly talk and hype makes an eyecatching blog with anti government activists joining in, but credibilty goes out of the window when you scratch the surface and actually understand the issues and whats exactly on offer.
SOT is a perfect example of daft words and rant being inserted in a legal document
" SOT is a perfect example of daft words and rant being inserted in a legal document"-DD
well yes-although i'd dispute the 'daft' words- I'll agree that the 'rant' doesn't actually belong in an SOT HOWEVER it is there-i assume- so that if should ever be offered as evidence before a tribunal then it may strike a chord with the 'judges' - who have in the past shown some sympathy with such things. If you read the past 'judgements' then you'll see what i mean...and as SH regularly wins written appeals for people I'll accept his way of expressing himself - daft words and all- works.
"its the complete lack of interest of the problem ( over11 years )despite the internet and blogging and even freedom liberty mongers don't want to know, "
Unfortunately this very thread is proof that you're right there. *weeps*
Despite this thread having so many comments, you DD, are about the only person arguing 'agin' us. Where are all the other non-N2D members regular readers and commentators of this blog? Don't answer that- I know already :(
Professor Simon Chapman is an anti smoker who is largely credited with smoking bans there and the Far East. I have obtained a photograph where it appears that he is covering up a study. Professor Chapman has taken the trouble to reply.
http://daveatherton.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/professor-simon-chapman-caught-trying-to-cover-a-study-that-said-no-correlation-between-second-hand-smoke-and-lung-cancer/
@DD
You're losing the plot totally now. 'UKBA are unfit for purpose', remember that? Seems perfectly reasonable to brand an agency as corrupt whilst their current policy of interviewing continues. You are capable of seeing the difference aren't you? You can condemn the agency but that does not mean everybody in the agency is corrupt. Surely that's simple enough for even you to understand?
You're wrong on the 70-80,000 too. lf trials were conducted under criminal law, most if not virtually all would be found unsafe because the accused were not allowed their statutory legal rights.
Under civil law, if seizures go to court all the judge has is hearsay with the accused contradicting UKBA and vice-versa. The judge does have however a notebook that was signed by the accused as being 'a truthful and accurate account of the interview' . The judge hasn't a hard decision to make has he?
Now if the judge has an unsigned notebook and what you call an SOT from the accused. lt does not matter if it was wrote on bogroll, spelling mistakes and so on. The judge then has to make a decision on the 'evidence' presented by both sides. If the accused has a recording of the interview and transcript of it, that's even better.
UKBA predominately use the first scenario having intentionally orchestrated it in the first place. N2D's advice is sound no matter if you scratch the surface or dig a big hole. You fail totally to show otherwise.
People are innocent till proven guilty, dear boy. Using bullying and intimidation to get a seizure is corrupt, therefore the UKBA is corrupt. Pressurizing people to just walk away and leave their goods WITHOUT a receipt is also corrupt.
Justice is far more important than anything else. Our society is supposedly built on this principle. ls not the statue of Lady Justice above the Old Bailey there to announce such to one and all? Or do you believe something different?
The UKBA are corrupt. The UKBA are not fit for purpose. Given these facts, only an idiot could argue otherwise.
Your call l believe?
@ SBC
It being under civil law, hearsay is allowed so you can virtually put in anthing you like. ln a criminal court l'm sure N2D would not use hearsay. Given their track record l'm certain this is true.
Dave Atherton
Have you got the right thread? :-)
@Nick
Yes I am recommending it to read.
We all owe a debt of gratitude to DD for showing us the mindset of the ukba, which is that any suspect baggage can be held back (in effect, the baggage is 'under arrest'). They can hold you up because they can hold your baggage up, although you personally are, of course, free to go at any time. That, in itself, is a dirty trick and a clear sign of corruption. Important though that may be in societal terms, it is not really relevant to individuals. What is causing the trouble for individuals is that they are unaware.
Before DD started commenting, I was happy with my letter to my MP as support for my statement that I do not sell my purchases on. Thanks to DD, I have now realised that the 'guideline' amount of cigarettes (800) is merely to give customs a excuse to stop and interrogate you. It has nothing to do with me since there is a law which permits me do do what I wish. Thanks to DD, I now realise that if I wish to expedite the process of going through customs, I need more. And so, I have proof positive that I can afford the trip and the purchases and that I have no financial need to smuggle. I have pretty good indications that the wife and I smoke 40 fags a day each (this is because we have bought abroad this year some 120 cartons). Those are the two critical things. I also have an SoT and copy of a letter to the Chief Executive of the UKBA stating my intentions. Remember, my intention is not to avoid an interrogation, but t expedite it. To provide no excuse for being held up.
It has been annoying and troublesome to produce all this documentation, but the actual cost has been one first class stamp, a few sheets of printer paper and some printer ink.
Damn. Every now and again I fail to close the italics tag properly!
Further about the lack of knowledge of individuals who therefore lack the necessary documents. The reality is that they are not advised by the authorities that they need such documents. Nothing is said. Why is that? I can only be another dirty trick. The vast, vast majority of people are decent, honest, trusting people. They do not realise that the prime objective of customs (and indeed, the Home Office) is to seize their goods. It would not occur to such people to search the net for information.
The Government use the same methods to persecute jobseekers. The techniques are similar. There is a set of procedures which the jobseeker must follow to the letter. Any failure is punished in the first place by a 2 weeks 'sanction' (over £100). A second failure within 12 months brings brings a sanction of 4 weeks (over £200) and a third failure brings a sanction of 26 weeks (over £1300). These sanctions are automatic. It takes weeks to appeal, and the appeals procedure is heavily weighted in favour of the decision makers, being only about whether or not they have followed the correct procedures. The process is awfully 'legalistic' and hardly anyone appeals. As with the UKBA, there are sites on the internet where people tell their stories of hardship and injustice. Remember the riots by young people? Did anyone see anything in the MSM about the callous way in which many of these jobless young people are treated?
Junican is right, the authorites actually want honest people to lose their goods, as a lesson to others. They resist all attempts by people who try to clear their purchases in advance.
The "free trade" element of the EU is a bitter pill that the Government has to swallow, so they operate what they call a process of disruption, to prevent cross-border shopping. It's dishonest, and it involves them in turning a blind eye to the regularly illegal behaviour of Customs.
This policy is hard for ordinary inexperienced people to believe in. Those who are victims of it, assume that it was an isolated incident. But word is getting out. It cannot continue indefinitely.
Personally, I hope that we will escape from the EU, and then it will become a moot point. But the fact of successive Governments' past gross dishonesty will remain.
Customs' policy of suggesting that intercepted shoppers can simply leave their goods and walk away, is an obvious recipe for corruption. There is no receipt, no paper trail. the goods can simply "disappear".
The Government's motive is to prevent cross-border shopping. Customs' motive is to appear successful, retain their jobs, and incidentally some will win a lot of freebies.
It's like the (Elizabethan?) times when the crown gave a warrant to Privateers to raid and loot foreign shipping. It was cheaper than maintaining a large navy. I anticipate that the Customs function will soon be privatised, and handed to someone like Group4. Just a theory, don't judge my credibility on it. :-)
@nick good grief nick take some time out and engage your brain before posting again!
No I don't believe they are corrupt because they are servants of the government and follow the law and carry out duties as ordered, where does the corruption stop for you nick? Tories and liberal voters only or should we include labour voters too
I believe offering a range of penalties for cigarette seizures which are both civil or criminal is the correct way, I don't want have a criminal record cos aunt fanny got a pouch of Baccy for looking after my cat
Is there any room in your one track mind to see cigarette smuggling is rife and many seizures are sound , and the cost of making everything a criminal matter would be massive to the country as well as unfair
I agree on a SOT (without the shite included), and bullying happens but That does not mean ukba is corrupt but individuals are,
Do you understand that nick? Because you seem unsure of such a simple idea of a bad apple/s
I don't want any bullies to use bullying to get a seizure but I don't want everything criminal either, your fairytale mindset mentions nothing of smugglers or honest ukba and fair and small penalties under civil terms.
That's the balanced and fair justice I want, which I'm afraid a tunnel vision idiot hasn't the ability to see
" I don't want any bullies to use bullying to get a seizure but I don't want everything criminal either,"
Actually I, and probably a lot of honest shoppers, would rather prefer it to be a criminal matter. The UKBA would then have to abide by PACE, there'd have to be evidence to back up a seizure, interviews would be recorded and a right to legal representation. Which is probably the reason why the present system is described by people who know far more about it than I as a 'legal anomaly'. Personally I believe that the government wants to keep it a civil matter to facilitate their highway robbery of us-the Cross Border Shopper.
[Interesting the only time the UKBA seem to want to use criminal law against shoppers is if the shopper 'fights back' and then it is the 'Terrorism Act' they -the UKBA- reach for....which makes no sense unless it's because they then , once again, don't need to follow PACE etc.]
"That does not mean ukba is corrupt but individuals are,"-DD
Read some of appeals and the answers of UKBA Officers Sked and Wiggs for example. Look at the pictures of OAP's and others physically mishandled. No not all UKBAers are nasty, officious and slightly moronic bullies BUT the mindset seems common.
@zaphod I agree about advance purchase and the muddle of the guidelines is a deliberate ploy to put off shoppers, But the idea of they want honest people to lose their goods which then will walk out the door as freebies is not an unexpected and unproven slant but one I don't share
Anyway carry on regardless, the extreme slants will continue and the why is nobody listening to us cries will continue
That's enough balance and common sense from me
@junican good luck with your trip
No, DD. It is not really corruption in individual officers that we are talking about. That may happen or it may not. What we are talking about is institutional corruption. This kind of corruption comes from the top. It probably starts with reasonable intentions - to cut massive 'avoidance' of duty - but, on the way down the management line, transforms into obfuscation, deceit and totalitarian practices.
@ Junican
Totally correct. Most of this came out in the Hoverspeed v Hmrc case. DD has no concept that these officers can only do what they do under policies coming from up above. This is further compounded by UKBA's complaints process which is an utter sham that allows these policies to continue unabated.
lndividual officers my arse.
Nick.
Your comment about the complaints process again reminds me of the Jobseeker's situation. I got involved in trying to defend a person who had been hit with a 26 week sanction. It was a steep learning curve. I wrote a letter in his behalf to the 'decision makers' giving an honest explanation of a missed appointment (a simple matter of oversleeping, really). They completely turned my explanation on its head and inferred therefrom that 'the culprit' could not therefore possibly have done this and that as stated. They were, in fact, logically wrong. A couple of days before the appeal was definitely going to go ahead, they withdrew the 26 weeks sanction and replaced it with an 8 weeks sanction. This process had dragged on so long that they then owed him over £400, which they eventually paid.
Institutionally corrupt.
@Junican, I see your point. Most people would happily acknowledge that those on benefits get the "run-around" whenever possible, with implicit approval from above. Even DD?
Smokers are, of course, another group who can be punished for merely existing, by petty officials, without incurring society's disapproval. I wonder why DD chooses to believe otherwise?
What does Simon think about this aspect of the smoker punishment program? We haven't heard from him lately. Has he found any of this thread convincing?
Simon?
DD, the troll who got banned from Daytripper.
@ Zaphod.
Taking a specific example, there are x number of jobs but y number of young men. y is greater than x, therefore, regardless of how hard y try to get a job, only y minus x actually succeed. We can describe y - x as z. z is those young men who are 'unemployable' because they do not 'appeal' to employers. They may not look right, or they may have odd ideas, or they may demand more than the minimum wage for their services. Whatever. The reality is that, without full employment, there will always be a group of youths who do not 'fit' the accepted pattern. Without full employment, these youths never have a chance, unless they 'go it alone'. Is it not likely that the 'go it alone' will be 'outside the law'? Since these youths are in a hopeless condition, why should they not, as seen from their perspective? Why should they not riot and plunder? Why should they conform to laws which persecute them?
It is true that these considerations lead th chaos, but that is what is happening. The smoking ban is leading to chaos since the quack medics are intent upon extending their remit to many other areas, such as alcohol.
What I say must be true.