Smoking in playgrounds? Let the people decide
Tuesday, November 8, 2011 at 16:42 Currently at Millbank Studios in Westminster.
I have just recorded an interview for East Midlands Today (BBC1). In a few minutes I shall also be on BBC Radio Nottingham.
Subject? Smoking in or around playgrounds and the school gates. (See Nottingham City Council to make playgrounds 'smoke free'.)
"What has this got to do with the local council?" I asked before querying the effects of smoking outside and the cost of all those 'Please do not smoke' signs.
"Parents," I concluded, "should be allowed to use their common sense and make their own decisions."
"Let's hope they make the right decision and don't smoke around children," said Anne, the presenter, firmly.
(The BBC doesn't do neutrality on smoking, does it?)
"No offence, Anne," I said off-air, "but that [comment] was a bit one-sided."
She didn't reply but I heard her record a new, less partisan, comment to finish the interview.
I'd be interested to know which version they broadcast.
Simon Clark
Click on the image above to see yesterday's report on East Midlands Today.
It's at the top of the programme. Interestingly, they did delete the excessively partisan comment with which presenter Anne Davies concluded the interview.
Reader Comments (9)
"No-smoking signs designed by children will be displayed in playgrounds..." (from the linked article)
We're halfway to SmokerFreeWorld colouring- in books...
Wonderful if the parents decided that the LA should just sod off and mind its own business, but more likely they'll comply rather than suffer the inevitable glares of contempt from fellow mummies.
So, parents are now guilt-ridden about smoking inside their homes, standing at the back door to smoke (the 7 step campaign), smoking in their cars and now at the school gates.
Next logical step - the children's play area of the local park....then the rest of the park.
Yes Joyce!
...the next logical step...will be...the planet...then the solar system and then finally...wait for it...THE UNIVERSE!!
"Let the people decide" - that doesn't include smokers obviously as we considered sub-human
"No-smoking signs designed by children .............."
Why not simply employ the agency (Bagpuss, Wallace, Gromit, and Weed) that designed the New Tory Party logo ?
This sort of thing should really be kept in-house, you know.
Is this one of the schools where, all over the country, they are happy to have bonfires and fireworks?
Just wondered.
From the BBC report:
"A local authority has become the first in the East Midlands to introduce a no smoking policy at playgrounds and around its school gates."
The operative word being 'policy'. But also notice the 'around school gates'.
So they have adopted 'a policy'. Wow! And what precisely is 'the policy'? It cannot be 'to ban smoking in playground and around school gates' since a ban is not 'a policy' - it is a simple fact.
No, the 'policy' is as stated thus:
"Nottingham City Council said it wanted to protect children from the effects of smoking and reduce its uptake."
Erm....or is it thus:
"It added the policy was not enforceable by law, but wanted people to comply."
Erm.....or is it thus:
"Councillor Eunice Campbell, from Nottingham City Council, said: "Parents do not want their children to be exposed to smoking or to take up the habit."
Or thus:
"We hope that they will support this initiative.""
So this wonderful policy is, in fact, a 'hope that people will comply". With what? Comply with what?
So the council <I>hopes that a mother will not enjoy tobacco while watching her child play in the park because some councillor thinks that parents.....etc, and because of some idiotic assumption of danger which is non-existent.
If there was ever an example of utter incompetence by councillors - councillors of a CITY council no less - this must be it. This actually puts Councillor Barlett in the shade. At least he was just a lone nutter. It is a good example of megalomania.
I note that alcohol and dogs have been included in this puritanical “policy” too. This would, then, I suspect be the same Nottinghamshire Council whom I discovered, on a recent visit to the area (not to be repeated, now) and a stop at the famed Sherwood Forest, had banned dogs from the area for “hygiene” reasons. As one of the main purposes for stopping was to give our dog a short walk after a long car journey, we didn’t even bother to get out of the car – but we were in the car park for long enough to see the plentiful scattering of wind-blown and recently rain-soaked soiled disposable nappies (yuk!) around the entire car park area, lovingly wrapped around the base of many of the trees. Ban dogs for “hygiene” reasons?? For Christ’s sake, the place wasn’t even hygienic enough to take a dog into in the first place!
Bearing this in mind, methinks that the Council folks in Nottinghamshire have their priorities just a little out of kilter, so this latest overbearing, holier-than-thou, “for the cheeldren” policy sounds just about right for them. Robin Hood must be turning in his grave ….
I do gather that the sweet soooo innocent young things will be dropped outside the school gates in mummy & daddies petrol guzzeling, exhaust spewing four x four ? Just wondered.
Yes Pat we are the untermensch.
"Let the people decide"?
Now, there's a quaint, old fashioned idea.
Revolution beckons, probably in the form of simply ignoring anything they say.