General Chat

It's strange that whenever someone complains about car emissions the drivers always come back with the evils of smoking! I get very annoyed with parents who drive their kids everywhere, and yet complain about smokers. I had no choice but to wheel my children out in buggies when they were toddlers, and they were in direct line to exhaust pipe fumes. Of course I realise the usefulness of cars. But far too many people, partcularly mothers, drive their children to school and countless other after school activities.....often in heaving great 4-wheel drives. A lot of people even drive to the local shops (5 minutes walk away) to make one purchase! Maybe when people drive, they cannot smell car fumes? Far, far more lethal than a waft of fag smoke outside Woolies. Try putting a hose on an exhaust and breathing it in! Dee x

theres a no smoking ban outside my hospital and underneath a no smoking sign guess what i seen...someone with a fag in her gob...whats the point

there is one good thing about people who smoke they never moan about people who dont :-) Rosex PS my best friend died of lung cancer at the age of 24 she never smoked in her life . i do agree though it is smelly but i still do it

I smoke about 6-7 cigarettes a day. I do give up now and then and I find it difficult - especially when I'm having a drink of beer, wine, tea or even water. I just enjoy a smoke with a drink. However, I don't smoke near children, sick people or in other people's smoke-free homes. I agree with non-smoking in public buildings, but I think if they are trying to stop people from smoking in the street, it's going a bit too far. If you work in a smoke-filled room, I agree, it is harmful, but I often wonder how much toxic air we breath in from cars and planes. Some families run 3 and 4 cars daily. No-one ever studies what effect that has on everyone and those fumes filter into everyone's homes both day and night. Margaret

No, I don't kid myself there is nothing wrong with smoking, I KNOW its stupid, dirty etc - but so are lots of other things, car emissions being one of them. My point is, you are far more likely to get cancer from car emissions than you are from my smoke, which I do NOT deliberately blow in anyone's direction, and the one second it takes to pass me, or any other smoker, outdoors is really not going to do you any harm. I am not defending smoking, I am defending my right to smoke in my own home, in my own car, and in the open air. I have bowed to other people's rights not to be polluted by my smoke in their homes, the workplace and restaurants - but my home is MINE, and I will do what I want in it. The Government could ban smoking tomorrow if it so wished and make criminals of some of us. They would miss the revenue though. Still, if that led to sugar, salt, saturated fat and alcohol being taxed at the same punitive rate as tobacco, then I might cheer up a bit. OC

You can get cancers from being a passive pedestrian too. Dee x

We were on holiday last week and there were several small sections (very small) that smokers could use, the rest of the large area was smoke free. So why did non-smokers decide to sit with us and then complain about the smoke?????????? It was obvious that it was a smoking area by the large signs posted there.

from my other half mick he says.I sympathise with Linda losing your mum to smoking is a cruel thing,I lost my mum the same way when she was 40 but have we all been living on another planet or is this country still a democracy???As a non smoker I feel that everyone has the right to choose,I am sure Emily Pankhurst would be spinning in her grave as she fought for the vote and i don't remember the public being given a referendum on this subject.Just a thought for all us non-smokers if the government abolishes smoking in public places what next?in your own home?? and most people stop,ask yourselves where the revenue they get from taxing cigarettes is going to come from?????Yes my fellow non smokers watch your tax rate soar.Oh yes if smokers die early the government does not have to pay their pensions.If we all live to a ripe old age then we send the already overstretched NHS bankrupt.As they say you can't have your cake & eat it!!!!!!

Well said Lynda.

To tell the truth I am fed up with all the rules and regulations that this Govt inflicts on us. We are all human, some of us have bad habits. If you think you may get cancer by breathing in my smoke when I am outside in the open air, then move out of my way. Most people don't give a stuff that they drive everywhere and that the fumes they create by using their cars for journeys which could easily be made on foot or by public transport are doing more damage to peoples lungs than passive smoking. And we pedestrians can't move out of the way of those poisonous emissions. Dee x

OC - I'm with you on this one sweetie.... us smokers are given a raw deal!! xx

I am a heavy smoker and I WILL NOT be bullied into giving up smoking. I will do that when I decide to, not before. Yes, its a filthy habit, and I do not generally inflict it on anyone else. I wouldnt dream of smoking in someone else's home, or in the workplace and I am resigned to having to stand out in the rain if I want to have a fag. But REALLY! My few puffs of smoke outside Wooliies, or wherever, are not going to give YOU cancer - at least, not before the car fumes get you. I was recently approached in the street by a hugely fat woman who began berating me for my filthy habit which was 'making her cough'. I told her that I would stop smoking the day she stopped stuffing her face with fatty, sugary foods. Childish, yes,I agree, but I am sick of self appointed policemen telling me what I am doing wrong - I KNOW its a dangerous and dirty habit, but so is not washing your hands when you have been to the loo, drinking to excess and stuffing your face with food long after appetite demands. And how many people do YOU know, who, because they have smoked 20 cigarettes, go home and beat their wives senseless? So - LEAVE ME ALONE...puff puff puff! OC

Well it will get worse ya know when they stop people smoking in pubs..... those pub gardens are going to be very full and not of children either!

Unfortunatly banning smokeing will never work! As part of my course at uni, I have to go around various hospitalls - all put up smaking shelters a few years ago (bus shelters to look at). As of Jauary All have locked you these shelters and declered all NHS site in the trusts Non-smoking areas - fair enough the staff leave the site during their luch breaks and go out side the gate or intop the trees on the boundry to smake but patients and visitoes still smoke on the grounds. The day patients stop smoking in the hospital grounds is the day they quit for good! I've also seen schools locally where the teachers have a smokeing lounge as well as the normal staffroom - I find it really bazzar as my teachers would have been disaplined for smoking in the school grounds - they use to wait until they got in the car or in the pub. Even as a child I hated smoking and at 7 tried telling 2 people who meant alot to be that smoking would kill them - one died when i was 16, caurse COPD seconary to smoking (since he as young) and pneumonis. I don't know what happened to the other one. I've given up reminding people of the conciquences now but my home will always be a smoke free zone.

I agree with Just Woody. Some years ago I spent some time in a wheelchair and only then did I realise just what youngsters in buggies have to put up with. The stench of car exhaust fumes was awful. I'm not getting into the argument for legal/illegal smoking - don't see how it could work to be practical - but am sure car fumes must be worse.

Agree about the car fumes etc. I used to work in a transport enquiry office - way back in 1967-9 before half of you were born probably! The exhaust fumes of the buses filled the area, inside and out, and is what I blame for my chesty problems. In fact, I hate seeing babies/toddlers in open buggies for just that reason - they're in line with car exhausts all the time.

I suffer from Emphysemia and Asthma, waiting for a bus can be a living Hell for me when someone near me decides to light a cigarette. Inhaling other peoples smoke is not just unpleasant for me, it is life-threatening. I could be sick, and usually start coughing, if anyone who smokes sits next to me on a bus. Do people who smoke not know how bad they smell? The stench is on their clothes, their hair, and their breath. Why should my health , (and my life), be put at risk by these drug addicts?

Maybe I am in a minority but when i work i never take a lunch break as I use that time split up for my cigarette breaks! I can't believe that smoking outside can be banned without making it illegal.............. like they have with drinking alcohol in the street! Yes its a habit, yes its disgusting but its a reality!! And as previously said cars cause more damage than cigarette smoke!! xx

I smoked half a cigarette in 1939. My opinion is that people should be allowed to smoke outside if they wish. If you are to be absolutely honest, what harm are they doing to other people.? You breathe in more noxious fumes everytime you are a near a road. Happy days

A lot of people on here have a good point about breathing in second hand smoke. I pay a lot for my cigarettes and don't see why people stood around me should have the benefit;)