Over the four years following the 2004 smoking ban in Ireland, 11 percent of the country’s pubs were forced to close their doors. Scotland was similarly affected. Does the department honestly want to jeopardise the survival of thousands of vital small businesses by unnecessarily tightening already-effective anti-smoking regulations?
Apart from the proposed legislation’s impact on the hospitality sector, implications for productivity across the public and private sectors must be considered as well.
Smoking, despite carrying a heavy sin tax, is legal in SA.
Employees are entitled to smoke breaks at work, but how will productivity be affected if smokers are not allowed to smoke a cigarette near any window, door or person? How far will smokers have to walk to find a legal spot at which to get their fix? Not only will the regulations hinder productivity, but will also be, practically speaking, almost impossible to enforce in urban areas where buildings are in close proximity to each other.
The government receives attractive tax revenue from the sin tax associated with tobacco products.
Smoking is a social habit, which often goes hand-in-hand with drinking, dining and gambling.
What kind of impact will limiting the places where people can legally smoke and reducing the places where cigarettes can be sold have on the government’s tax income?
I love this,I love everything about this.
Which quite honestly is really fucking rare.
Leon Louw is a very intelligent man.
Then again looking at things from a free market standpoint instead of a "healthy world" standpoint seems to make things much clearer.
I truly love the fact that someone twice nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize wrote this.
