Forest has been fairly quiet on the issue of e-cigarettes.
I have written about them from time to time but we have enough on our plate - plain packaging, proposed bans on smoking in cars and in parks, EU-led bans on menthols, ten packs, small pouches of RYO tobacco etc etc - without fighting a battle that others are perhaps better placed to win.
Nevertheless Forest supports consumer choice and electronic cigarettes offer exactly that, whether you want to cut down, quit, or merely want an alternative to cigarettes in places like pubs and public transport where you can't smoke.
Most of the current focus is on harm reduction, with e-cigarettes being promoted as a smoking cessation aid.
That's fine, but it ignores the fact that a great many e-cigarette users (not the loudest, perhaps) are using them in addition to cigarettes, not as a direct replacement.
Forest's job is to support and defend adults who want to smoke tobacco.
There's a clue in the name - Freedom Organisation for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco - hence our annoyance when some e-cig advocates (and manufacturers) turn round and lambast smoking and, by implication, smokers.
Anyway, the e-cig lobby has been pretty vocal of late so they hardly need our help. When asked to comment, however, we'll happily offer our tuppence halfpenny.
Yesterday Scotland on Sunday reported that the British Medical Association has written to Celtic and Rangers urging them to reconsider their relationship with the e-cigarette company E-Lites and their policy of allowing e-cigs to be used inside their stadiums.
On Thursday afternoon the paper invited Forest to respond. I was told:
The BMA has a number of concerns about issues such as children being exposed to seeing smoking as a normal thing and undermining the restrictions on smoke-free places. They also have concerns about the limited regulation of the products at present and the impact of "passive vaping".
On Friday I sent this quote:
"The idea that e-cigarettes are a gateway to smoking is ridiculous. Overwhelmingly they are used by smokers who want to cut down or quit, or smokers who find them a useful alternative in places where they can't light up.
"The BMA's position defies logic. There's no evidence that e-cigarettes are harmful to anyone, including the vaper, so it seems perverse to stop people using or promoting them.
"If they were genuinely interested in public health the BMA would support and encourage the use of e-cigarettes. Instead they want to restrict them using the feeble excuse that some e-cigarettes look like the real thing.
"It may have escaped their notice but that's why smokers are comfortable using them and why clubs like Celtic and Rangers should be applauded for embracing them."
None of it was used although, to be fair, I may have missed the deadline. (Update: I'm told my quote was cut due to "lack of space".)
Instead there was a short comment from E-Lites director Charles Hamshaw-Thomas, an old friend of Forest.
Today, however, Brian Monteith (editor of Forest's Free Society website) has used his column in the Scotsman to attack the BMA's "self-serving politically correct agenda".
Although he is writing in a personal capacity, Brian's overall stance is pretty much in tune with Forest's, especially his final comment:
It is time those in public health – including the BMA – recognised that smoking will not go away, that the policies of prohibition are counterproductive and are only creating a new breed of rebels. Better then that they resort to harm reduction and with e-cigs save more lives than they ever will with their laws, their bans and their outrageous terrorising of smokers.
Amen to that.
Full article: The battle over e-cigarettes (Scotsman)
See also: Wanted, a consumer champion for e-cigarettes who is not anti-smoking, Will e-cigarettes take centre stage in 2013?, Why I hate some e-cigarette retailers, The arguments against e-cigarettes.