Why are Britain’s pubs shutting?
As my old drill sergeant used to say, “Listen Up!”
Below is a piece from The Economist Online website: Economist.com
The headline: Britain’s pubs, Closing time
July 22nd 2009
From Economist.com
A PINT of beer down (at) the local (pub) is a quintessential part of British culture. But in recent years many Britons have changed their drinking habits, shunning the pub and preferring to imbibe at home instead.
Now over 50 pubs are closing every week, almost double the rate of a year ago, says the British Beer & Pub Association, a trade group. The recession, cheap alcohol at supermarkets, and a smoking ban in pubs enacted in 2007 are all to blame.
The government is also taking a bigger chunk in tax: from around 8p a pint (a pence is roughly worth a U.S. penny) in 1980 to nearly 38p now. Local boozers face the biggest struggle, because they are least likely to offer profitable food, coffee and the like. Meanwhile, chain pubs and café-bars are opening at a rate of two a week.
Notice, there is a direct correlation between a ban on smoking in British pubs and the shutting down of a cultural icon. I saw the same thing recently in France. Some cafes would not let you smoke outside, either.
With the recession tightening everyone’s belts, isn’t it about time that government lawmakers got some sense on this issue? If consenting adults want to smoke inside a pub, why don’t the non-smokers take their pints outside? That’s what smokers have to do. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. But, I’ve said that before.
I smoke a pipe because I enjoy it. A pipe relaxes me, helps me deal with the stress of the day at the end of the day. I like a pint at the end of the day along with my pipe. That also relieves the stress and strain of watching my hard-earned retirement slowly, but inexorably fade away. At 67 years old, I don’t think anyone is going to be hiring me for any sort of work, except perhaps at a Big Box store, wearing a colored vest, welcoming shoppers. Or, I might qualify to flip hamburgers, or maybe I can bag groceries at the local supermarket, if I can beat out the school kids who get most of those jobs.
Pipe smokers, and others who use tobacco products, must unite behind a solid effort to fight off this Tobacco Prohibition. Otherwise, the Tobacco Prohibition will create a black market, in which the tobacco user and state coffers are the loser. Costs will rise. Government agencies will lose the all-important tobacco tax revenue, and the recession will linger in some form for quite a long time.
I wish I knew how to unite tobacco users. It will take much smarter people than I, but I know it has to be done, or we will lose one of our most precious rights: freedom of choice.
Tobacco Prohibition is already taking Britain by storm, and has moved to America in a big way. Very few American restaurants and bars allow smokers of any stripe. But, in Tennessee, you can carry a concealed weapon into a bar! Now, that makes sense.
Before all the gun folks jump me, I own guns, hunt and have handguns. I grew up hunting and fishing. I love to shoot and was once a decent duck and squirrel hunter (I live in Tennessee, home of famous squirrel hunters, don’t you know). I am not, repeat, am not against owning guns. However, I do not like assault weapons, but that’s another story for another time. I hold sacred the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which says I have the right to bear arms. I am glad that amendment is there, because it is certainly needed in this day and time of outrageous behavior by lawmakers and others who are cavalier with Americans’ rights.
If the movement to ban smoking in one’s home catches on (see Pipes and Tobaccos Magazine, Spring 2009, pp 8-14) because of “third hand smoke” theory, then you and I can no longer claim that one’s home is one’s castle.
There is a serious infringement of your rights at work here. I fear for the pipe smoker’s future.