The UK government seems hell-bent on the control and micromanagement of its own population.
Their recent smoking ban -- which is sure to make cigarette smoking cool again with young people -- was a joke. This hyper-surveillance measure is a lot less funny.
The smoking ban is incredibly popular and supported by most people across all generations, also given we have tax payer funded healthcare this is a clear win for the nation.
Only if smoking is seen as cool, which it isn’t any more. Vaping is the way to go for kids these days and whilst still not great it seems like it’s better than smoking.
Spare some thought as to why it's no longer "seen as cool."
That's about to be turned on its head. Banning smoking will make it seem edgy, transgressive, and alluring. Still worse, banning it only for people below a certain age will make it seem mature and sophisticated to those below the cutoff. The forbidden fruit.
The UK Govt couldn't possibly devise a better way to popularize cigarettes with young people. And they'll create a nice little black market, to boot.
suppose we design a reasonable experiment here, like taking a random sample of teenagers and mitigating for anonymity concerns. are you seriously claiming that this would show an increase after the ban?
or to put it another way --- the phenomenon you point to is real but completely swamped by the more direct impacts
The Postmaster debacle is the biggest example of this I have ever seen. Something has dramatically changed when people are not being held accountable for their crimes.
We do indeed lead the way in draconian bullshit. We also lead the way in making it utterly unworkable and useless through incompetence, cost cutting and cases getting shot down by ECHR though. Think of us as an example to the rest of the world on how to do a shitty job of consultation, legislation and implementation!
Weren't the Tories going to get the UK out of the European Convention on Human Rights? And thus remove the possibility of appealing the the European Court of Human Rights.
Yes they are. They have a valid point leaving it regarding immigration, but the side effects of it are far more advantageous to them personally and this is not being discussed.
Their recent smoking ban -- which is sure to make cigarette smoking cool again with young people -- was a joke. This hyper-surveillance measure is a lot less funny.