Geoff Norcott – Taking Liberties

Comedian Geoff Norcott, who performed at Forest's 40th anniversary dinner at Boisdale in June, starts his 2019 UK tour on September 19.

Coincidentally the 28-gig tour is called 'Taking Liberties' so I feel duty bound to give it a plug. (Tickets are available here.)

We were fortunate to book him for the Forest dinner because although he's not a household name (yet) his profile has risen enormously in the past year.

Apart from regular appearances on The Mash Report (BBC2), he's appeared on Question Time (BBC1) and recently presented an entertaining BBC2 documentary, 'How the Middle Class Ruined Britain', which is still available on iPlayer.

Following the 'Taking Liberties' tour he is returning to Boisdale (on November 25) and I'm going to claim some of the credit because after our event in June Boisdale MD Ranald Macdonald messaged me to say:

"Geoff Norcott was absolutely fantastic. I don’t like stand up comedians but he was superb. I'd like to book him."

Tickets, with or without dinner, are available here.

Time to abolish publicly-funded stop smoking services

I was due to appear on BBC Sussex yesterday morning to discuss a new anti-smoking campaign being launched by East Sussex County Council.

I was asked on Friday but they wouldn't tell me anything about the campaign because it was "under embargo" until midnight on Sunday.

Early yesterday I checked online but there was nothing about it (not even on the BBC Sussex news page) so I was faced with going into the interview 'blind', as it were.

Ten minutes before I was due on the producer rang to say the item was being dropped because they wanted to cover another issue – something to do with a local MP and Brexit.

Fair enough. That sort of thing happens all the time.

The producer did however send me the council’s press release and I could see why the story got the chop because to call it 'news' was a bit of a stretch:

One in Two East Sussex Smokers Will Die Early, According to New Campaign

A hard-hitting and heart-wrenching campaign launches today (Sep 2) across East Sussex highlighting the devastating impact of tobacco on smokers and their loved ones. The ‘Be There Tomorrow’ campaign urges smokers to quit now using local help available to them.

According to Darrell Gale, director of public health for East Sussex County Council:

“There is so much free help available locally to help you quit smoking. A lot of smokers aren’t aware that you’re up to four times more likely to quit smoking successfully if you go to your free local Stop Smoking Service than if you try to quit using willpower alone.

“They are based in easily accessible locations, such as pharmacies and GP surgeries, and can give you help and advice, from learning how to cope with cravings to finding the best way to help you quit.”

Essentially, then, the launch of the 'Be There Tomorrow' campaign was little more than a plug for the county's stop smoking services.

I don't know the figures for East Sussex but I do know that nationally smoking cessation services have faced an increasing struggle to justify their existence.

From 2010 to 2016 the number of smokers using them to help them quit fell by over 50 per cent, which tells its own story.

Anyway, before writing this I found a report, dated January 2019, that was headlined ‘East Sussex County Council is looking to slash 230 jobs in a bid to balance the books'.

Now, I don’t like to see people lose their jobs but a very obvious saving for “cash-strapped” East Sussex County Council would be the abolition of all publicly-funded stop smoking services.

It’s hardly rocket science yet tobacco control is demanding the very opposite - greater investment in a service that is clearly past its sell-by date and is used by fewer and fewer smokers to less and less effect.

Meanwhile, who should be whinging about government cuts to smoking support services but the ‘UK’s biggest vaping retailer'.

According to a report published yesterday:

“Our customer engagement tells us that most smokers want to quit,” said Doug Mutter, director at VPZ.

“Sadly, the huge cuts in public health spending is currently failing smokers throughout the country and they are being denied the vital help that can truly transform their health and wellbeing.”

Failing smokers? Oh, give it a rest. You sound just like the tobacco control industry.

But here's the twist. Prompted by the “huge cuts in public health spending”:

VPZ said it is set to launch a new support service in its stores to help smokers turn from cigarettes for good, amid the reduction in available support.

Great idea.

If vaping companies want to encourage smokers to switch to alternative products by setting up ‘support services’ within their own stores, that’s absolutely fine.

The point is, they – not the taxpayer – should foot the bill.

The independent Dr Marewa Glover

I've written before about Dr Marewa Glover, a New Zealand-based tobacco control campaigner.

In May 2016 I quoted a report that highlighted her opposition to extending smoke free areas to outdoor public spaces.

I then added:

I can't remember hearing another health professional talk about smokers in this way, treating them like human beings and expressing concern about "segregation", "shaming", marginalisation and so forth.

See 'Compassion in public health is rare - ain't that the truth'.

Dr Glover is also against excessive taxation on tobacco because of the disproportionate impact on the poor, and although I don't agree with everything she says I'm always struck by her transparent decency.

Earlier this year, as I wrote here, she was one of only three people nominated for the 2019 New Zealander of the Year award.

She didn't win but it was a considerable achievement to be shortlisted. For some of her colleagues in tobacco control however it was a red rag to a bull and evidence has emerged of an extraordinary campaign to stop local boards of health from working with her.

The reason they have turned on her is because it emerged that Dr Glover’s new enterprise, the Centre of Research Excellence, has accepted money from the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World whose sole funder is the tobacco company Philip Morris International.

Now, you will be aware that I am not a fan of PMI or the Foundation whose goal, as its name suggests, is the eradication of smoking.

Nevertheless, I have no problem with any tobacco company funding research that might progress the cause of risk reduction.

The industry has every right to explore and conduct research into safer alternatives to smoking. Indeed it would be morally and ethically wrong NOT to do so.

Funding – directly or indirectly – independent, well-regarded researchers like Marewa Glover should therefore be applauded, not condemned.

Unfortunately the global public health lobby wants this field strictly to itself so it can maintain a monopoly on ‘science’ and research and manipulate politicians and public opinion accordingly.

Talking of which, Dr Glover last week blew the whistle on one of the most scandalous aspects of the anti-smoking crusade when she told a committee of New Zealand MPs:

“In tobacco control over 35 years, we have exaggerated the effects [of secondhand smoke] deliberately to scare people off smoking. We thought we were doing the right thing.

“What we didn't realise, was that years down the track, we'd be in this situation where everyone believed what we said and are now taking these extreme, punitive measures, when the evidence does not support the need for it.”

She made this admission while arguing against a proposed law to ban smoking in cars with children, which is still legal in New Zealand.

It was a courageous thing to say because we know what happens to researchers - professors Enstrom and Kabat and Sir Richard Doll come to mind - who go off message on passive smoking.

Dr Glover went on to add that what people "miss is that our bodies heal, so even if we are temporarily exposed [to tobacco smoke], we heal from that". 

Her audience - members of the Health Select Committee - were horrified (‘MPs aghast over tobacco researcher Marewa Glover's claim 'bodies heal' from secondhand smoke’) but as someone commented on Twitter:

I am not sure why they would be aghast about the truth ... the Min of Health website says that the body starts to repair itself the moment you quit smoking.

Regarding smoke inhalation, the simple truth is this. The dose is the poison and most of the evidence suggests that to be at serious risk from environmental tobacco smoke you would have to be exposed to it hour after hour, day after day, year after year, for 15 years or more, and even then the risks are very small.

In reality very few people ever experience that level of exposure. Moreover, as I have frequently pointed out, the generation of children most exposed to tobacco smoke in the home and in the car (ie those who grew up in the Fifties and Sixties) are now living longer and healthier lives than ever before.

Advanced medical treatment is one reason we’re living longer but if passive smoking is such a threat to people's health you would expect there to be clear evidence that the generation significantly more exposed to tobacco smoke than any other is significantly less healthy than the generations before or since and to the best of my knowledge there is nothing to suggest that is the case.

Anyway, I take my hat off to Dr Glover for being so forthright with the committee. For a leading smoking cessation expert to make those points - even if she was only saying what many of us know to be true - was pretty brave because it has not only given further ammunition to those who want to damage her career, it has also shone an important light on how the tobacco control industry operates.

I don't doubt that some smoking cessation campaigners, including Dr Glover, acted with good intentions (though that doesn’t make it right). Many more however are driven by an ideological hatred of the tobacco industry – or a personal obsession with smoking – that clouds their judgement.

A handful of researchers like Dr Glover have no time for that and she is to be applauded.

That said, I hope her independence extends to standing up to and opposing PMI's unpleasant campaign against smokers, part of which recently brought to mind the UK government's extremely offensive 'If you smoke, you stink' campaign (see a recent tweet below).

In short, if she can maintain her empathy for smokers, even when accepting funding (indirectly) from a bullish ‘anti-smoking’ company like PMI, that will be another huge feather in her cap.

"When you're so close to someone, and your breath smells or your pants smell, it’s not that great."

Dancing is a big part of Marius' life. Since unsmoking two years ago, he has felt more confident as a teacher and when performing during dance finals.https://t.co/msLKjTA9Ia pic.twitter.com/gw16mPVZ3s

— Philip Morris Intl (@InsidePMI) August 14, 2019

Farewell, Norman Lamb

Sir Norman Lamb, the Lib Dem MP and former health minister, has announced he is standing down at the next election.

As Lib Dems go he was one of the nicer ones but truly liberal? Let’s check his voting record.

In 2006 he voted for the smoking ban.

In 2011 he was absent when a majority of MPs voted against a Bill that would have relaxed the smoking ban and allowed smoking in pubs and private members clubs where no food was being served.

In 2014 (and 2015) he voted to ban smoking in cars carrying children (and justified it here).

He also supported plain packaging, even when the government of which he was a member was going cold on the idea.

Here’s what I wrote in 2013 when he continued to lobby for the policy, despite allegedly reassuring a constituent that it would not be introduced until the government had seen clear evidence from Australia that it worked.

And it wasn’t only smoking he had in his sights.

Five years earlier, in 2008, I experienced his interventionist tendencies first hand when I took part in a discussion on binge drinking that he chaired.

The word ‘chaired’ makes him sound like an impartial moderator. In reality he made it very clear that, in his view, the evidence of harm caused by binge drinking supported a "powerful case for society to intervene".

‘A decent chap,’ I wrote at the time, ‘but better, perhaps, if we'd had someone more impartial in the chair.’

So why is Lamb considered by some to be ‘liberal’?

Two reasons. One, his support for vaping. Two, his campaign to legalise cannabis.

Last year, as chairman of the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee, Lamb suggested that offices and even public transport should allow vaping:

“E-cigarettes are less harmful than conventional cigarettes, but current policy and regulations do not sufficiently reflect this and businesses, transport providers and public places should stop viewing conventional and e-cigarettes as one and the same. There is no public health rationale for doing so.”

I agree with some of that - although it was unwise, I think, to imply passengers should be allowed to exhale clouds of vapour on buses and trains - but easing some of the restrictions on vaping doesn’t mean smoking should be banned in all public places or tobacco should be hidden from view and sold in standardised packaging, measures he supports.

As for his campaign to legalise cannabis, it included, in December 2018, a 10-minute rule bill that was defeated by 66 votes to 52. According to the MP for North Norfolk:

“It is total hypocrisy that the most dangerous drug of all, in terms of harm to yourself and others, alcohol, is consumed in large quantities right here in our national Parliament, whilst we criminalise others for using a less dangerous drug - with many using it for the relief of pain.”

Last month Lamb even became the first MP to be filmed taking cannabis on British television.

This of course has made him a bit of hero in circles where cannabis is cool and tobacco is not.

But does it make him a liberal and how can we be sure that his views on e-cigarettes and cannabis won’t change?

This, after all, is a man who voted AGAINST a ban on smoking in restaurants in 2003 before changing his mind and supporting the prohibition of smoking in every pub, club and restaurant in the country.

This is also the man who spoke out AGAINST the tobacco display ban in 2008 (“This is the nanny state going too far”) yet did nothing to stop it being enacted when his party was in government.

In 2013 he even lobbied for the introduction of plain packaging.

In other words, Norman Lamb is like so many politicians - a disappointing flip-flopper whose voting record staggers from laissez-faire liberalism to heavy-handed interventionism.

It would be harsh to say ‘good riddance’ but, from my point of view, he won’t be missed.

See also: ‘Norman Lamb: Doh!’ (Liberal Vision, May 2013).

Food glorious food

Excuse the indulgence.

I enjoy eating and I especially like rich, spicy (or fried) food, which will probably be the death of me.

Here, then, are some of my favourite dishes from our trip to North America:

Grilled Spanish octopus, Aerlume, Seattle

Buttermilk fried chicken, Aerlume, Seattle

Huevos rancheros, 5 Spot, Seattle

Tilikum fry up, Tilikum Place Cafe, Seattle

Sweet Dutch baby, Tilikum Place Cafe, Seattle

Pork belly, sausage, eggs, potato, toast, Homer St Cafe, Vancouver

Spicy ebi gyosa, Kosoo, Vancouver

Soonsal chicken w/ spicy garlic sauce, Kosoo, Vancouver

Duck sausage, Salmond n’ Bannock, Vancouver

Finally, here’s one that is definitely an acquired taste:

Sea lion, Salmond n’ Bannock, Vancouver

End of the holiday

Home!

After 17 days during which we visited Seattle, Alaska and Vancouver (above), we arrived back at eight o’clock last night having had very little sleep for 26 hours.

The flight from Vancouver to Heathrow took off at 10.00pm (Western Pacific time) and arrived at 2.15pm (BST) almost nine hours later.

As luck would have it we were upgraded to premium economy. We were also in the first row which meant there was plenty of legroom and we didn’t have the annoyance of the person in front reclining their seat directly into your face.

On the other hand a fellow passenger in our section snored constantly - and very loudly - for hour after hour and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

(My wife, never short of a word, said, “Now you know how I feel.”)

Meanwhile, in the row next to us, a rather sweet baby gurgled and cried quietly (like a cat) before - eventually - drifting off to sleep.

His slightly older brother, however, who was no more than a toddler himself, kept up a running commentary - demonstrating an impressive use of the English language - long past his normal bedtime.

Eventually he too slipped off to sleep before waking up a few hours later, crying loudly and wailing, “I don’t like this! Why are we still flying? My tummy hurts!”

The joy of being one of the first off the plane and sprinting through passport control in a matter of minutes was then dashed when it was announced that a technical fault meant we would have to wait almost 90 minutes for our luggage.

To cut a long story short we eventually arrived home almost six hours after we landed.

Anyway, a final word on Vancouver which has just been rated the ‘friendliest city in the world’ in an online survey.

I don’t normally pay much attention to these things but it won’t get any argument from me.

I’d read a lot of good things about Vancouver (the food, quality of life etc) and in the short time we were there it didn’t disappoint.

Without over-exerting ourselves (it was a holiday, after all) we saw quite a bit of the city.

Highlights included the Roedde House Museum, a fascinating snapshot of life for one middle-class family at the turn of the 20th century.

A delightfully eccentric pair of volunteers gave us a guided tour of the small house, built in 1893 only seven years after Vancouver was established as a city.

The tour concluded with afternoon tea being served in the parlour room.

We also discovered some wonderful restaurants.

Kosoo, which serves traditional Korean food, was an unexpected treat. We stumbled on it by accident after finding that Sura, the Korean restaurant we intended to book, was closed on Monday night.

Another find, courtesy of my wife, was Salmond n’ Bannock which describes itself as the city’s ‘only First Nations restaurant’ serving ‘Native Canadian fare such as wild fish, game meat and bannock’.

I ordered duck sausage, bison hot pot and sea lion.

With the help of a local ‘guide’ I also visited a couple of cannabis stores, one licensed, the other unlicensed (ie illegal).

That was interesting too and when I get a moment I’ll write something about it.

I may also post pictures of some of the food we ate while we were away. As anticipated, I have gained half a stone and some of the trousers I took with me are, how shall I say, a tighter fit.

In the meantime, excuse me while I catch up on lost sleep ...

Below: The catamaran on which we returned from our day trip to Victoria, Vancouver Island, on Tuesday

Vancouver to Victoria

Two more days before we fly home.

We are currently in Vancouver and yesterday we visited Victoria on Vancouver Island.

There are four of us so we decided to travel in pairs - one pair taking the seaplane (a 35-minute flight), the other taking the ferry.

I, naturally, opted for the ferry. What I hadn’t realised was that the terminal was a 45-minute journey by taxi from our hotel in downtown Vancouver.

In fact, it is almost on the US border.

Anyway, we arrived in good time for the 9.00am ferry and 90 minutes later arrived on Vancouver Island where a further 30-minute taxi ride took us to the Parliament building overlooking the harbour in Victoria.

We arrived at 11.30, four hours after we left the hotel, and there, waiting for us, were my wife plus fellow traveller Helen whose seaplane had glided gracefully - and directly - into Victoria harbour ten minutes’ earlier.

It was time for something to eat so we wandered up to the Fairmont-owned Empress Hotel which, like the Parliament building, overlooks the harbour.

Fairmont owns The Savoy and other luxury hotels so we bit the bullet and ordered afternoon tea (at midday) at £50 per head. (It was a cheaper option than lunch!)

The sun shone and it was altogether a glorious day.

Our tickets to Victoria were one-way only so we decided to return to Vancouver aboard a V2V (Victoria to Vancouver) catamaran that somehow took longer than the ferry but departed from Victoria harbour and dropped us in the heart of Vancouver, a short distance from our hotel.

Unlike the ferry, on board facilities included waiter service, complimentary drinks (including a glass of fizz) and a 3-course meal.

Best of all was the view of Vancouver as we arrived shortly before sunset.

Recommended!

Ship to shore

Today is the final day of our seven-day cruise around Alaska.

We are currently sailing to Vancouver having visited Hoonah, Juneau and Ketchikan. The other days were spent ‘at sea’.

Hoonah, which we visited on Tuesday, was a mile and a half from the jetty at Icy Strait Point where the ship docked for the afternoon.

The path to the town followed a rough, dusty road but there was little to see or do when we got there. A cluster of houses - some no more than wooden shacks - several churches and one or two bars.

There were plenty of small boats in the harbour but the days when the local fishermen could get rich are long gone.

On Wednesday the ship took us to Hubbard Glacier which, in truth, wasn’t as spectacular as I had been led to believe.

The problem, I think, is that cruise ships can only get close to the glacier during the summer months, and even then the size of the ship limits how near you can get.

I can imagine the scenery looks far more dramatic in winter when the surrounding hills are covered in snow and the sea into which the glacier ‘flows’ is also frozen.

To see that however you’d have to hire a small plane or helicopter.

In Juneau, the following day, we rented a car and drove to Mendenhall Glacier.

Can I be honest? It was much the same as Hubbard Glacier, albeit seen from land rather than sea.

Rather more impressive is the rate at which both these glaciers are retreating - one metre a day, apparently. (See Update below.)

We witnessed it for ourselves because on several occasions we saw large blocks of ice breaking off and crashing into the water below.

We also heard several rumbles of what sounded like thunder but that too was the ice cracking.

Neither glacier is going to disappear any time soon though. Hubbard may be in retreat but if I heard correctly it’s still seven miles long.

After Mendenhall we drove to the National Shrine of St Therese of Lisieux who was named patron saint of Alaska in 1925, following which they built a chapel in her name.

Today, in addition to the chapel, there are log cabins - two of which can be rented as a retreat - plus a tiny unmanned gift shop that relies on discretionary payments (a dollar for a can of flavoured water, for example).

It was a beautiful spot with very few visitors. Perfect.

Other news.

There have been one or two whale sightings but, inevitably, my back was turned at the crucial moment.

I did catch a glimpse of a large ferret-like creature among the rocks on the walk to Hoonah but the bears we were warned about were nowhere to be seen.

(We were instructed to stay in small groups and, if approached by a bear, to make a lot of noise. We were also told not to run, which is easier said than done if you ask me.)

Another warning (this time at the Avis car rental cabin in Juneau) read:

CAUTION: Vehicles returned smelling of fish or animals or with blood and hair will be charged a minimum cleaning fee of $500.

It makes a change from being threatened with a cleaning bill should you choose to light up in a hotel room.

Talking of which, I would advise smokers to avoid Icy Strait Point and Hoonah.

From the moment we got off the ship there were signs telling us that ISP is a ‘designated Non-Smoking Property’.

Other outdoor signs read ‘Tobacco Free Zone’ or simply ‘No Smoking’.

Overall however it’s been an enjoyable week and four days in Vancouver still to come.

Best of all, perhaps, the days at sea have given me the chance to read Andrew Roberts’ wonderful biography of Churchill, ‘Walking With Destiny’ (‘Undoubtedly the best single-volume life of Churchill ever written').

In view of the gathering storm at home, let’s hope Boris has read it too!

Warmly recommended.

Update: I’m told that Hubbard Glacier is expanding not contracting. It’s Mendenhall Glacier that is retreating one metre per day. Nature works in mysterious ways.