The Government has launched a new campaign to remind smokers of the "dangers of second-hand smoke".
Second-hand smoke, we are told, can cause middle ear infections (glue ear), asthma and even cot death.
Forewarned, Forest issued a press release yesterday afternoon. It will go down badly with those who want us to deny that smoking poses any risk to anyone - including smokers - but I don't care.
This is the real world and I'm getting a little bored with people who say Forest doesn't represent smokers because we (a) acknowledge there are health risks associated with smoking or (b) make comments such as "Everyone knows there are health risks associated with smoking".
It's true we don't represent the head-in-the-sand smoker who wants to party like it's 1959.
Nor do we represent the smoker who wants to quit and is perpetually apologising for his "disgusting" habit.
Forest, I like to think, represents the middle ground, a broad church that includes millions of adults who choose to smoke in full knowledge of the health risks (some of which are exaggerated) yet are considerate to those around them, especially children, accepting the need for some restrictions on where they can light up.
Anyway, this is our response to the Government's latest campaign:
A consumer group has accused public health campaigners of "unwarranted scaremongering" after the government launched a campaign to highlight the "hidden dangers of smoking in homes and cars".
Simon Clark, director of the smokers' group Forest, said:
"No sensible person would expose children to tobacco smoke in a small room or car, but to suggest that homes and cars should be entirely smoke free is, we believe, unwarranted scaremongering.
"In our view the risks of secondhand smoke are being exaggerated to meet the demands of a public health industry that won't rest until smoking has been banned in all public and private spaces.
"It's a deeply illiberal agenda that has no place in a free society.
"If the government is so concerned about people smoking at home or in their own cars they should amend the smoking ban so pubs and clubs can offer separate smoking rooms for adults who want to smoke.
"Education is better than coercion but government needs to offer smokers a carrot as well."
On several radio stations this morning I went a little further. I repeated our position that we do not condone smoking in a small enclosed space with children present but are strongly opposed to legislation.
I said I was sceptical about some of the information that is being bandied about, pointing out that glue ear – to take one example – is not exclusive to children of smokers. Far from it. My own son had it and he was never exposed to tobacco smoke as a child.
Likewise cot death and asthma. The number of asthma sufferers, as we know, has tripled in recent decades while the percentage of smokers has halved. Go figure.
I also asked listeners to put things in perspective. In the Fifties and early Sixties, when a majority of adults smoked, millions of children were exposed to cigarette smoke every day in their homes and cars.
Bizarrely, if you believe every piece of anti-smoking propaganda, that generation is living longer than ever before (ie in the history of mankind). I'm not suggesting there is a correlation, I hastened to add, but we should avoid scaremongering and exaggerating the effects of second-hand smoke to the extent that even smoking outside the back door is considered unacceptable.
Anyway, in a hostile political and media environment, smoking and health (especially where children are involved) is not the easiest subject to handle without being portrayed as a flat Earther or a swivel-eyed loon.
If anyone thinks they can do better I invite them to have a go - beginning with their local radio station - instead of whinging on the sidelines.
Good luck.
PS. This morning I was on BBC Radio Newcastle, BBC Radio Tees, BBC Radio Sheffield and BBC Radio Devon. This afternoon I'll be on BBC Radio WM (at 4.35).
Update: Angela Harbutt is on LBC shortly after 2.00pm talking about whether smokers are being bullied too much.