MPs have voted to ban smoking in all pubs and clubs in England. This is a tough one for me, because I’m very much on the fence on this issue. But, for the record, I don’t smoke, and I don’t like people smoking around me. That just doesn’t necessarily mean I want it banned.

As a healthcare (apparently) professional, I should be jumping up and down at the prospect of people not smoking in pubs and clubs, and raving about how this legislation will save people’s lives, and reduce the rate of lung cancer and other smoking-related diseases. But I have my reservations. Yes, this will undoubtedly stop some casual smokers from smoking, and possibly thereby stop other people who might start as casual smokers from ever starting. It will also protect staff from the effects of passive smoking. Some lives will inevitably be saved.

But what about the (stereotypical) poor household, where dad would wander down to the pub for a pint and a smoke each evening? Is he not now going to smoke more at home, and do more damage to his poor kid?

And what of the heavy smokers, who are those most at risk of disease? This legislation is unlikely to change their habits. And what of the little villiage pubs? Is the local PC really going to Plod round there and slap a fine on them for failing to ban smoking? Especially if PC Plod himself smoke, or the consolidation of police forces means that he’s out of a job and the nearest police station is fifty miles away? Will the problem not increase in these ‘underground’ pubs, where more people are potentially at risk as the pub serves as the hub of the community, and people are in there more often than the trendy wine bar in the city?

On top of all of that, it’s another government dictat, which are inevitably controversial, and shift the balance of power further away from the people who elected the government in the first place. My argument throughout this saga has been that if pubs are brave (like Wetherspoons briefly was), then they’ll ban smoking. If there’s such a demand for non-smoking venues, then their business will increase, and other pubs will be economically forced to follow suit – including the little villiage pub, who would be introducing the change off their own back, and so be more inclined to make the ban stick. This would be a gradual change, which would change the public’s and smokers’ attitudes to smoking in general, and would probably have more far-reaching effects than simply banning smoking in these areas. Smoking would become increasingly socially unacceptable, which is a powerful force in getting people to give up.

So, whilst the ban is clearly a good thing in that it will save lives, I’m still not convinced that it was the best way to tackle the problem. But it’s a way, and it looks like it’s here to stay.

Yesterday was a fantastic day for Mr Brown. Tony Blair’s stranded thousands of miles away, so the Crown Prince gets to make one of the most important speeches of the political season, get incredibly controversial legislation throught Parliament comfortably, and then get praised by nearly all the papers this morning. It seems too good to be true; and in politics, if it seems that way, it usually is.

Perhaps I’m just too cynical, but it seems rather suspicious to me that in the week that Mr Brown apparently steps up his campaign to take over as leader, and with relations between the PM and the Chancellor apparently smoothed over, he should get this golden opportunity. Just the other day, Charles Clarke came out with a carefully co-ordinated and calculated statement that the two neighbours were now sharing the Prime Ministerial role, then Mr Brown gets to make a hugely important speech on security which is, in reality, way outside his remit as Chancellor, and now he gets to head up one of the most important (though very clearly winnable) votes of the year so far. And anyway, in the event of the PM’s absence, surely it should be his deputy that steps into the limelight. That’s kinda what he’s there for. Not that tradition and the constitution normally count for much in the Blair world.

It even makes me somewhat suspicious about Mr Blair’s big loss of a few weeks ago. Labour doesn’t lose votes like this. Could it have been a choreographed attempt to show Mr Blair as losing control, in contrast to yesterday’s vote supposed to show that Mr Brown is well in control of the party? Stunts like this would certainly make the transition of power easier, and isn’t a smooth transition what they both want?

Some people have been getting rather het up (to say the least) over the publication of twelve cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed. But how can I, in good conscience, post something as potentially offensive as this, and then not post a cartoons like this? To do so would be to say that I respect the beliefs of Muslims above those of Christians, and that’s simply not the case.

I never post with the intention of offending people. So whilst I wholeheartedly apologise for any offence caused by the cartoon, but simply cannot apologise for publishing it here. I accept that it’s against the Muslim religion to depict Muhammed, let alone belittle him in cartoons. But it’s equally against the Christian religion to depict Jesus as a skimpily-clad camp guy doing a Gloria Gaynor impression. As much as it is the right of the holders of those beliefs to follow their relgion in their own way, I have the right not to follow the rules of their religion. If people are offended by my choice, then they equally have the right to challenge my saying it, and even to mock me if that’s what they want to do. But nobody has the right to stop me, or anybody else, from saying something they believe in order to stimulate debate and discussion.

In this particular instance, I’m merely using the cartoon to illustrate a point. I have to say that I think the imagery appears to me to be somewhat offensive. But that’s not stopped me publishing imagery which may be offensive to followers of the Jewish faith for purposes of discussion. In such cases, posting the image clearly does not imply agreement therewith, but merely faciliatates discussion.

As I’ve already said, I intend to offend no-one. That probably can’t be said for the writers of comments on this site, such as this. Clearly, I tend not to agree with the assertion that I am a ‘little shit’ or a ‘fucked up prick’, yet I don’t feel the need to censor the writer’s (misguided) beliefs, but merely debated the finer points of her argument. Was I able to do this without resorting to anger because I’m a really calm guy, or just because I’m certain of my beliefs? Perhaps if shakier beliefs of mine were challenged, then I would have more difficulty in responding, and so feel more angry towards the challenger. Whatever else is said, violent aggression from the defendent can only ever damange his cause – especially when that cause is a basically peaceful religion.

Update
After several requests, I’ve now put the full set of cartoons online here. Please feel free continue to use this page for discussion of them.

Update
For the sake of sensible, reasonable discussion, I’ve removed the cartoon which previously appeared on this page. Read all about why I’ve done that here, and rest assured that you can still view all of the cartoons on this page of the site.

Evidence has been revealed this evening that Mssrs Bush and Blair decided to go to war on January 31st 2003, despite the abscence of another UN resolution. Of course, we all pretty much knew that anyway, but it’s going to be on the front pages for a little while again, mainly because this is further evidence that Mr Blair lied when he repeatedly said no decision had been taken. And there’s the unfortunate photo, right, of them following the meeting where they decided to kill tens of thousands of people, which instead looks more like the engagement-announcement sequel to this.
Earlier this week, the 100th British soldier killed during this war gave his life for someone else’s country. The greater tragedy is that we’ll never know when the 100th, 1,000th, 10,000th, or 100,000th innocent Iraqi civilian was killed, because we never bothered even trying to count.

One of the biggest belly-laughs of the day comes courtesy of PMOS quoted by PA:

“He will make sure he does vote in future on important votes,” said Mr Blair’s official spokesman. “This was a one-off.”

This was apparently a one-off occasion on which Mr Blair has missed an important vote. Presumably, the September 1998 vote to cut student funding, the April 2000 vote on the Freedom of Information legislation, the January 2001 vote to ban hunting with dogs, the November 2001 vote on Afghanistan airstrikes, the November 2001 vote on anti-terror legislation, the February 2002 vote on single-faith schools, the March 2002 vote on the licensing of hunting with dogs, the February 2003 House of Lords reform vote, the June 2003 vote on hunting with dogs and with the use of knives specifically form all-knives.org, and the December 2004 ID cards vote – all of which were variously described as ‘important’ or ‘crucial’ votes – were just one-off occasions where the PM didn’t bother voting too.

In fact, he has the worst voting record of any modern PM, turning up for just 94 out of 1250 votes in the last Parliament – a pitiful 7.5% attendance rate. Most MPs, by comparison, turn up for about 65% of votes.

So really, the fact he bothered to turn up for the first vote was more of a one-off.

Last time he lost a vote, Blair threw his toys out of the pram, then said he’d not lost his authority. Yet, despite having a Parliamentary majority of sixty-six MPs, he still can’t get legislation through Parliament.

Let’s break this down. Mr Blair leads 356 MPs. There are only 290 other MPs. Yet Mr Blair can’t get legislation through Parliament. As much as I happen to agree with the fact that this particular legislation is completely useless, it cannot be denied that Mr Blair is losing his authority.

No doubt Mr Blair will make a big deal of the fact that he only lost by one vote. But that means that at least sixty-seven of the people he ‘leads’ voting against him. That’s nearly 20% of the Parliamentary party. And not only did he lose, he’s so out-of-touch with his own party that he thought the legislation would fly through, and didn’t even bother voting himself. Now that’s losing authority.

Mark Oaten has been forced to resign as the Lib Dem Home Affairs Spokesman, as he has some, erm, Home Affairs of his own to take care of, after some Away-from-Home Affairs to be reported in tomorrow’s News of the World.

The 41-year-old father of two allegedly had an affair with a 23-year-old rent boy. If you’re going to screw up your career, I guess you should do it in style – and a homosexual affair with someone half your age is about as far as one can credibly go, I guess.

Some will no doubt claim that it’s unfair he’s had to resign over something which says nothing about his professional competance, and I have some sympathy with that point of view. But it’s just not a realistic stance to take in today’s society, sadly. He had to resign, because he would never be allowed to talk about the issues.

More surprising is that he gave a classic non-apology in his statement, of the type perfected by New Labour:

I would like to apologise for errors of judgement in personal behaviour and for the embarrassment caused, firstly to my family but also to my friends, my constituents and my party.

He apologises for errors in judgement – that is, getting caught – and the embarrassment it caused, but not actually for the incident itself. Which is surprising, because I thought he’d be the kind of guy to give a grovelling apology practically for being born. But then, I guess he’d have had to resign as an MP as well if he’d gone down that route, so perhaps it’s not so surprising.

On something of a sidenote, it’s been an amazing couple of weeks for the NoTH – Sven allegations last week, more promised this week, a journalist in the Palace, and Oaten allegations this week. Certainly not bad going on their part.
One Springeresque final thought on Mr Oaten: His website hasn’t been updated yet. It says

It’s been an eventful past couple of weeks … I’m looking forward to a quiet weekend with my family before making any decisions on what the future may hold.

Somehow, I doubt he got his wish.

Nick Robinson’s latest blog post seems to suggest that he’s hearing mutterings of Mr Blair’s departure happening later this year.

Could they have reached another agreement on the handover? I just leave that question hanging… for now.

Does this mean he has some info that he’s not ready to share quite yet? Interesting… Or am I just reading too much into it?

As the Conservative leadership content heats up to an almost tepid finale, it’s becoming increasingly obvious that the next General Election will be fought between Gordon Brown and David. But which David? Well, Cameron, most probably. Let’s be realistic here. The chances of David Davis winning are – well – low. This represents an interesting moment in modern politics – the heavyweight, overbearing Labourite vs the touchy-feely everyman Conservative. Reverse the party allegiances, and that could’ve been written ten years ago. Well, maybe not. John Major was never exactly heavyweight or overbearing, but he was clearly very ‘establishment’, which Brown also has a flavour of. Or summert.

My point (if I have one) is that the electorate appear to be looking for a change in leadership style, and bizarrely it’s Labour who are likely to supply this, while the Conservatives are desperately trying to emulate Blair. Which is somewhat unusual, and seemingly unwise.

But perhaps the Conservatives aren’t going for the Blairite approach at all. Perhaps they’re actually trying on the ‘chat-show Charlie’ Lib Dem approach, given that Charlie Kennedy is seemingly the most liked of the party leaders. If Cameron can manage to turn the Conservatives into something resembling a modern party, where a wide range of views are held, openly discussed, and considered, instead of the Labour approach of everybody being whipped into Tone-clones, then maybe he’ll be very successful. But then, when the Conservative party get talking, they seem to suddenly discover that they really don’t like each other, and re-enter the wilderness years where a number of factions roughly equal to the number of Conservative MPs appear, and no-one quite knows what’s going on, or what the party stand for, but are united in their dislike for the current leader. And the next leader. And possibly the one after that, too.

It seems rather cruel to criticise Cameron before he’s even taken office. But heck, since when has that stopped me? At the end of the day, in all likelihood he’ll do a reasonably good job. But without the united support of the party, that’ll mean nothing.

Clearly, the fact that Blair has finally been defeated is humourous in itself, but the reactions to it have also tickled. Start off with the desperate-to-be-loyal Blairites, who insist that, despite the fact that 30 of his own MPs have defied him, he has apparently not lost his authority. Yeah, right.

And then, on the other side of the political fence, the amusing interview with IDS, in which he said it was important to stand together and vote as a party on these issues. Until it was pointed out that several Tories had voted Labour’s way. When suddenly he completely contradicted himself and told us he’d always thought that it was on issues like these that politicians should vote with their consciences. Well done with that one.

Today, we descended further into the realms of bizarre claims and general ridicule as Mr Blair claims that he’s more in touch with the common man than his MPs. I think there’s a chance his head is more in touch with his own rectum that most people’s, but that’s pretty much all he’s in touch with.