LANSLEY ADMITS CONSULTATION IS A SCAM

Bully state hate persecutor Andrew Lansley has finally come clean and admitted that consultation on plain packaging - which will cost his pet tax payers a wad of their hard earned cash - is a complete scam and he isn't listening to anyone except those who agree with him.

In this age of austerity, where the mothers of sick children are being forced out to work for nothing for his pet charities, one would think that spending money on false consultation when his mind is already made up would be a price the country couldn't afford.

But paying to incite hatred of an industry and its consumers that Lansley holds in utter contempt is obviously well worth the economy taking a nose dive.

Smoking is my choice and it doesn't, has never, and will never affect anyone else no matter how much the paid-for, manipulated, and corrupt studies incite fear of me.

Nutter Lansley's incredulous stance that getting pissed on alcohol every night is more responsible than having a cigarette indicates that he needs dragging off by men in white coats with straight jackets.

I am jumping mad that this choice that has been a lifelong pleasure from the age of 8 - when Govt quite happily took my tax - is now set to brand me as a criminal when I'm old because Lansley is a Nazi moving to the penultimate stage before the final solution for adult consumers.

The bully and his pathetic Nanny Milton must get plain packaging, you see, because they can't jump from a ban indoors within five years straight to criminalisation of people they despise - they must keep taking these tiny "logical next steps" which are not logical to anyone who isn't blinkered by raging prejudice.

To those who read this blog from all countries in the world, I know you used to think that Britain was a model of democracy, fair play, and decency but you are wrong.

It has become a communist country where people who don't agree with Govt ideology could face jail, ruination, or humiliation. That is the future here. A bleak Britain with no free speech, no free thought and no free action and no free choice for consumers.

And they call this a free country?

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SHAME ON THE BHF

We've all heard the British Heart Foundation bleating on about how much it cares about the Chiiiiildren - the poor sick Chiiiiildren who shouldn't have to endure a second near a dirty filthy smoker - but when this "caring" organisation can make a few bucks and do Govt a favour then it's concern suddenly dissipates and it becomes clear that it doesn't give a toss about the Chiiiildren at all.

Why else would this self interest organisation be complicit in dragging worried mothers away from their sick children's hospitals beds to be its own personal slaves as long as it is well rewarded with its 30 pieces of silver and a pound of rotting flesh with a Govt so far up its arse a good organic crap wouldn't shift it?

Not only does this scumbag political lobby group "charity" steal cash from the heart of the NHS to promote hatred of people it doesn't like, and cause them to be shunned and avoided in their former communities, it also sucks so hard on the Govt nipple that it is happy to help bolster the Govt's slave labour scheme and allow for the families of sick children to be shamefully exploited - even if it adversely affects the child's health.

A mother I spoke to this evening, but she won't allow me to say who because she is too scared of the reprisals, has a seven month old baby, and a five year old daughter. She was not allowed to claim Income Support when her son reached four months old and was forced into claiming Job Seekers Allowance instead.

Her daughter is in hospital, diagnosed yesterday with Type 1 diabetes and the mum has to learn how to inject the little girl four times a day with insulin and get it right - her child's life depends on it.

It's a hard thing for the family to come to terms with but they know they have to because this is something that the child will have for life.

It's not caused by food and it's not caused by smoking, so maybe that's why the BHF is happy to turn a blind eye to the separation of mother and needing child and embrace exploitation of such vulnerable people because the BHF stands to gain from it and the Workfare scheme.

The mother has to work for the BHF for free. She won't even earn extra expenses so she can earn a little extra on top of her breadline benefit for the special diet that she might now have to budget for.

As an enforced slave worker for the BHF the mother can't be late (even if the injection takes longer than anticipated until she gets the hang of it) or the BHF will report her and she will lose every single penny that the family depends on and is entitled to.

How did this country get to be so damn spiteful and avenging on those who deserve it least?

Workfare is the Tory cack-handed scheme to get back at Labour's benefits classes because Tory voters are fed up of paying tax to keep chavs who sit at home watching Jeremy Kyle all day.

These people should be complaining about the money being screwed out of them via Govt from the likes of the BHF and others in rent-seeking industries that pretend to "care" rather than mums like this who haven't got time, frankly, between cooking, taking to and from school, shopping, cleaning, washing, caring.

Workfare is a scam. It is supposed to be "voluntary" and only for young people to get a foot on the career ladder and in the jobs market if they want it but in reality the "one size fits all" approach is tragically flawed.

Instead it affects people like the young mum and a relative of mine who was made redundant from his job in a local garage, which didn't have the money to pay him anymore. He's now back working there under Workfare for free as work experience in the job he's been qualified to do for 20 years.

This is simply to justify the dole he's paid and to which he is entitled to after years of paying tax and becoming unemployed through no fault of his own - as is the young mum because her extended family pays tax on their income even if she does not.

As someone who worked unpaid for three years before getting the job of my dreams, I know matching employer with willing and enthusiastic worker can't be achieved by force. I managed it because there was no red tape, or positive discrimination, to stop me then.

Labour managed to halt social mobility and enterprise and give the jobs that were available to EU citizens so the benefits class was squeezed completely out of the job market - and now, it seems to me, they are being punished for simply being poor and having absolutely no prospects of decent work in future.

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THE GREATER DANGER

Maybe I said too much yesterday that the Govt smoke free lobby groups and supporters didn't like so they felt the need to denigrate the smokers' view by putting out yet more propaganda that "proves" we kill not only our own babies but other people's too.

I obviously failed to get across to tobacco control that its public health initiatives are beginning to do more harm than good but maybe others can get through and show Govt that the public hate health campaign needs to stop and re-evaluate.

The truth behind the latest junk science, manipulated press release study that attacks pregnant smokers has been thoroughly debunked by Chris Snowden.

In addition, the Hands Off Our Packs campaign has made an excellent video about the plain packaging attack on consumers and the damage it will do economically and socially.

The smoker intolerants who are doing so much damage are being exposed as part of the Nupuritan movement which is pushing for an Age of Disapproval.

Puritanism has only ever caused more damage and misery than happiness. It's campaigns always lead to greater danger than greater good. History shows that such righteous pressure at the expense of other people's liberty causes civil war, as it did in Britain in 1648, and organised crime, as it is did in 1920s America.

Organised smuggling and crime around tobacco was non-existent before tobacco control and as it grows so the black market grows and moves with the demand created by Govt denial.

I don't think there will ever be another civil war in Britain but I do believe the NuPuritans' excessive control is causing dissent, getting ordinary people involved in politics, and draining support for consensus politics and traditional party support.

If there is a revolution one day it will be political and it may well come in the form of a UKIP presence in Parliament. It is the only party with a growing membership and defection rate and the only one that's actually listening to what the voter wants.

The Conservatives would be wise not to ignore it or the reasons why people are joining in droves. Maybe it's already too late. People who used to sit down the pub, smoke, drink and chat about anything but politics, have opened their eyes since being forced to stay at home, and they don't like what they see.

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PHEW

I got up early this morning to take part in a BBC Radio Newcastle debate on the Stacey Soloman vilification and as I sat waiting for the call, I got one from BBC Radio Tees asking me to go on straight after and then Radio Sheffield who wanted me immediately after that.

The Newcastle interview was a bit of a scrap. I was opposite Ailsa Rutter from Fresh Smoke free North East. She maintained that smoking killed babies and there was a huge mound of evidence to prove it but I scrutinised that claim by asking what causes the cot deaths in the 210 non smokers' babies each year and why were only 40 smoker parents singled out for blame?

I also pointed out that Sudden Infant Death Syndrome by definition means that that even after autopsy there is no known cause found so there is nothing to say that smoking causes cot deaths except for a belief that it does.

Ms Rutter didn't like that and mentioned all the 4000 chemicals in tobacco and I pointed out that they were on a DoH approved list. She lost it and said that simply wasn't true even though I offered to send her the link and then we started to scrap, the show needed to move to the news and I was suddenly cut off without knowing why so I rang back and asked if it had been accidental or intentional.

I was told that they simply ran out of time and Ms Rutter had slammed the phone down because she was not able to respond to the points I'd made.

I'd like to thank GasDoc for his comment in the previous post because this gave me the courage and authority to rebuff Ms Rutter's claim that ALL doctors agree that smoking kills all babies. I said the one size fits all approach is dangerous and doctors do actually sometimes advise women who have smoked for years to cut down rather than quit completely because in their individual circumstances, quitting could do more harm.

Radio Tees was far more civilised with a PR marketing lady and a male property developer from the North East. I found there was a lot of tolerance there and a willingness to hear both sides of the story.

When the question of child abuse came up, I said that my children don't hold it against me that I smoked during their pregnancies and they would be very upset to hear their loving caring mum branded in this way.

Even one young mum who quit smoking, drinking and everything for her pregnancy said to base a woman's ability to be a good mum on the fact that she enjoys a couple of cigs a day while pregnant was wrong given that motherhood is for a lifetime - not just for pregnancy - and mums who smoke are as good as any other.

The PR lady said she felt it over the top to accuse pregnant mums of child abuse but maybe the term was more relevant for those who smoke in cars or homes. I pointed out that the BMA lied about it's 23 x figure, got caught out and debunked, but not one news organisation carried its retraction after putting out the initial false scaremongering report.

I also said that 90% of parents won't smoke in the car or home when kids are present and we didn't need the jackboot of law affecting us all to get to the few who don't. I suggested that a persuasive campaign is better if they want to reach them but it would have to be something that includes and involves them voluntarily rather that public vilification which just causes anger and a desire to dig the heels in and smoke more.

The Radio Sheffield slot went well too with me being able to point out how Govt lobbies Govt through the smoke free "charities" and how they are not "charities" as the public generally recognises them but more like political lobby front groups with an incestuous relationship with Govt which is coercing people with public bullying into falling in line with their ideology.

I also said that we were consumers who did not deserve being treated in this way given that the product was legal and we pay a hell of a lot of tax on it. I said denormalisation might seem Ok to stop the product from being the cool, glamorous activity of old, but they should remember that behind it are real people. They should not be targeted in this way because the perception of smoking had changed in just five short years with the smoking ban which was about victimising smokers to enforce this change of perception.

I also made my point known about how dangerous it is to equate heroin with smoking because it gives the wrong message, as one who once sat on the committee of a real charity group that supported friends and family of drug users including many heroin addicts.

I came on last and when I'd finished my bit the radio presenter thanked me and said it was a great comment to finish on.

A very busy morning. I hope I represented your views as an ordinary pissed off consumer well.

I have no idea if any of these interviews are available via a listen again facility but if you''re interested, I'm sure you could find out.

As for me, well, I'm really not too keen on the sound of my own voice.

UPDATE 3.40pm I've just finished an interview for BBC Radio Birmingham on 50 years since the first health warnings came out.

They played recordings of interviews taken in 1962 when 70% of people smoked and the reasons people didn't quit then are not a lot different to why we still smoke today - something will get you in the end and one thing we know about life is that it's terminal. We will all die at some point so it's about making the most of being alive and some us find an enjoyment of tobacco helps with that.

I pointed out that with the wealth of information and studies done since 1962, we are now able to look for ourselves to get a balanced view of the risks. I said that we can't trust the tobacco companies and we can't trust what is now an anti-smoker industry pushing constant propaganda in our faces which does have a very nasty and spiteful feel to it.

As I waited to go an air, a lady was already talking about another issue and just happened to mention that her mum died of lung cancer. She was asked, due to the discussion that was to follow, if her mum was a smoker and she no. Both her parents were lifelong non-smokers even though she herself did smoke.

I pointed out that there is a genetic factor involved when smoking triggers cancer and that if cancer or heart disease is in the family then don't take the risk. But for people like me, lifelong smokers, there was a study that suggested it is more harmful to quit.

The presenter seemed in disbelief. I told him it was featured in the Guardian at the time. He said the Guardian probably covered it but would not have supported it. I asked if a newspaper's role was to scrutinise and offer balanced information so that people could decide for themselves based on their own lives and experiences - or was it just to promote Govt propaganda. He didn't answer.

I guess time was running out and he wanted to mention the Birmingham East PCT graphically violent video that I complained about with David Atherton.

We got it removed from the web because the gory viral that showed a smoker getting beaten to death gave the wrong message to extremists. I pointed out that this was a disturbing social factor that appeared to have arisen solely as a result of the ban and that there had been many cases of smokers getting killed or beaten by extremists, and cases where anti-smokers and smokers, who used to get on OK before the ban, were suddenly attacking each other.

After the presenter said he understood I was fighting for my right to smoke but ... I cut in and corrected him. I fight simply for my right to be left alone without harassment from anyone - even Govt.

So far, so good, the phone hasn't rung again.

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SACKED FOR BEING A SMOKER

I don't know who Stacey Soloman is but I've been defending her since Saturday night when some Paparazi photographer happened upon her smoking and saw an opportunity to make a few big bucks at her expense.

The People newspaper then decided because she's a celebrity who presents a best mums TV programme she should be shamed and held up for abuse on its front page.

I discused it on the Stephen Nolan Five Live Radio programme, where I met an obnoxious and bigoted former Talksport presenter, Ian Collins, who regarded pregnant women who smoked as bad as axe murderers.

Collins refused to accept any other side of the argument, or that there was evidence to the contrary of what was written on cigarette packets and why smokers are banned from every public place. Indeed he accused me of "making it up" to "validate my argument."

Now it seems her bosses have sided with this smokerphobic ignoramus view and have sacked Stacey Soloman from her job

Almost all Callers to the programme thought she should not have been targeted in this way. One woman who phoned into the Nolan Show said her doctor advised her that quitting could be more harmful in her situation than cutting down.

Collin's response was that her GP should have been reported to the General Medical Council and struck off.

The smoking ban coupled with years of the drip-feed abuse from Govt against smokers has caused this hatred on the false and unproven assumption that parents who smoke cause harm to their own children.

It put this lone women and other vulnerable people out in the open where they could be a target for any old extremist or newspaper hack to attack.

If she'd had a glass of wine in her hand instead of a cigarette, it might only have made a column buried within a celebrity gossip news page - for now anyway.

The worst aspect of this is the pure, unadulterated prejudice that smoker parents are somehow not as good as non smoking parents. They are the best, they love their kids, they care for them, nurture them and they make the same kind sacrifices over decades, and not just a few months, the same as parents who don't smoke but might enjoy something else occasionally said to be "bad" for them.

Indeed the Govt should come clean and say that there IS evidence that smoking occasionally can be good in pregnancy especially during the latter half and it can prevent the very thing it is accused of causing which is far more of a risk to unborn babies than smoking

And I'm about fed up of the Govt pointing the finger of blame at the 40 grieving smoker parents who lose babies to cot death. There are 250 unexplained sudden deaths of babies in the UK every year. It happens to non smokers too - 210 of them. What are they doing wrong?

The very definition of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) is the sudden death of an infant that is unexpected by medical history, and remains unexplained after a thorough forensic autopsy and a detailed death scene investigation

That means there is nothing at all to say that smoking causes cot death except for a belief that it does.

To blame any parent for this kind of tragic loss of a child is cruel. To single out smokers without evidence is wicked.

The number of road casualties amounted to 208,648 in 2010. Are we going to start blaming pregnant mothers involved in car accidents and promote publically how selfish they are for driving and not walking? I would hope not. I would hope this blame game stops and our culture of compassion returns.

Women have the right to be informed of all the factors that COULD harm their pregnancy but they don't deserve to be humiliated, exposed, denigrated, or sacked if their informed choice leads them to do something the Govt and its pet smokerphobic extremists dislike.

If the stress of losing her job and looking down a black hole instead of a career does cause Stacey Soloman enough stress to lose her baby then I am sure they will just blame the two cigarettes a day she smoked without seeing the damage they have done.

I would hope this doesn't happen. If it does, then I also hope that she sues the arse of The People for running a campaign that could seriously harm her and her baby.

UPDATE : Mark Wadsworth has declared Stacey Soloman Mum of the Week and I'll second that.

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PUBLIC HEALTH CAMPAIGNS KILL AND HARM

H/T to Dick Puddlecote for bringing my attention to Simon Chapman's report on why the villification and social exclusion of a minority consumer group is fair game to further the political aims of the anti-tobacco cause.

The report shows that Denormalisation does cause real harm to real people who enjoy smoking but Govts still support it because the end justifies the political means.

Smokerphobics might believe that smokers are addicts who infect others so they deserve it but the truth is the evidence does not support their paranoid stance.

Tobacco Control with political help justifies the removal of our human and civil rights and defends smokers' exclusion from healthcare, jobs, homes, and communities because smoking is what we do and not what we are. It's a shame that some employers don't see it that way and deliberately exclude smokers because of who they are and not what they do because of this publically funded propaganda promoted by Chapman and others from his industry.

But then we were forced into being "smokers" and not ordinary "consumers" implicitly because of the "Denormalisation" tool which deliberately pushed us into the identity created for us.

Adult lifelong consumers who started smoking as children in a different age, probably before many of today's politicians had even left infant school, were simply dismissed as collateral damage in the ruthless pursuit of a future without smokers.

Those who justify a deliberate hate campaign to spoil the identity of people once held in high regard in their communities should just take a look at the real harm Denormalisation, stigmatisation and marginalisation of smokers has caused over the last decade.

There is the nutter encouraged to believe that smokers stink who killed his wife and children because of it

The 12 year old boy who hanged himself rather than be exposed as a smoker

The UK worker bullied to death for smoking out of work

The Welsh girl who died from aerosol can poisoning after trying to hide the smell of smoke from her parents

These are not isolated incidents. They have been caused directly because of the smoking and anti-smoker propaganda.

And since public smoking bans were implemented ending the culture of consideration, tolerance and choice, these incidents have got worse as smokers and anti-smokers who once rubbed together well now turn on each other.

The current health programme encourages extremists and nutters and it has no place in a moderate, fair and equal society.

There is a line that Govts should not cross in forcing trying to bring smokers along to their view that we should all quit, but Denormalisation is a good mile over it.

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END GOVT BACKED HATE AND MISINFORMATION CAMPAIGN

We know that cancer, including lung cancer, is a disease mostly of old age unless you're unlucky enough to carry the cancer gene that could finish you off early whether you smoke or not.

We know that only 17% - 20% of people - men and women - will get lung cancer and that there are many other factors that play a part in triggering it from cow's milk to pork to chemtrails and traffic to tobacco.

So why has the political lobby group ASH, that masquerades as a charity, today claimed that women from my generation are only at risk from tobacco?

Could it be a political ploy to avert attention from yesterday's report that shows it deliberately carried out a hate campaign against smokers who refuse to quit?

Perhaps ASH just wants to try and entice a few more women and kids into smoking by advertising the forbidden? After all, tobacco companies are not allowed to advertise their products so openly and woe betide them if they were to buy huge advertising billboard space to promote cigarettes in a way that ASH and it's partners do all the time

It seems to me the only people promoting tobacco and cigarettes to kids is the anti-smoker industry - after all, it does need future smokers to ensure it's own survival.

Kids today can't walk 100 paces without seeing a whole myriad of No Smoking signs and the first thing they'll ask is "What's smoking?".

My kids were taught honestly and given balanced information from me which may be why three out of four don't smoke. Others will be taught to hate people who smoke from a very early age depending on how prejudiced their parents are about smokers.

**

As a smoker who began in childhood, I can assure ASH and the Govt if it really wants to know, that I never started smoking because of packaging. It was always price that determined what I bought and Players No 10 were the cheapest at 7 and a half pence (three(old)pence) when I first started buying my own.

Before that when we dealt in old money, I took the odd one or two from my elder sister and brother's packets even though both smoked different brands.

I don't remember a single TV or magazine advert. I read the Twinkle comic as a kid and Jackie Magazine as a young teenager. I don't recall any tobacco advert in either of them.

ASH reminds us how glamorous the Sovereign packet was in its latest propaganda hectoring but despite the "glitzy" gold packaging, and the fact that they were the same price as No 10, I preferred the latter despite it's much plainer packaging because I recall No 10 tasted better.

ASH should stop lying to the public for its own gains and Govt should stop pandering to it and stop it from advertising cigarettes to kids today in it's ridiculous and infantile campaigns.

After yesterday's expert report that shows ASH and its partners in the DoH deliberately carried out a hate campaign against smokers, I think we should report it to the Charity Commission.

Blad Tolsty wrote an excellent piece HERE reminding us all of how "charities" are now defined differently and ASH for all of it's political lobbying, does qualify legally as such.

However, "charities" can lose funding if they have carried out hate campaigns. Yesterday's expert report shows that ASH and public health have done just that with the deliberate stigmatisation, marginalisation, denormalisation and exclusion campaigns against our particular social group. Perhaps the Charity Commission will take a complaint seriously with that in mind. It certainly should but we also know that laws apply to anyone and everyone except smokers who are legal targets for hate and misinformation that cause them to be shunned and avoided by their communities.

**No 10 photo from HERE plus a whole lot of other nostalgic photos of brands long gone thanks to anti-smokers' mission to deny adult consumer choice.

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