George Orwell Will Be Right.

This morning I woke up to the news that the Labour Party want to ban smoking in cars carrying children. Straight away I picked up my iPhone. It's Facebook and Twitter time. 

"I am an ex smoker but this banning smoking in your own car when driving is yet another erosion of our freedom. No, no, no!"

"If they get away with banning smoking in cars they'll be round your house setting up social services cctv monitoring your parenting and making sure you "remember to tell your kids to vote Labour.""

Now admittedly at first I misunderstood the report and thought they were saying banning all smoking in private cars. The actual report was only cars carrying children. My opinion on this is mixed. Now I don't dispute that exposing children to tobacco smoke has some level of effect on them but that's just it.  I stop at 'some level.' In the same way as climate change apologists try to blame all human activity for these changes, so there is this same thing happening with smoking. They try and make it a black and white issue where it is most likely many shades of grey. I accept that smoking is harmful to health but exactly how harmful is the amount of smoke in a room in a house or a car travelling with the window open a crack?

A large percentage of adults of the age of 30 and above grew up successfully with smoking parents at home and in cars and I think any harm is minimal indeed. Is it really necessary to erode peoples' personal freedom for something that isn't really particularly harmful? This law would be more damaging to the liberty of the British people than the minimal harm it is supposed to stop. Imagine if you went to hospital with a ingrowing toenail and when you woke up they had amputated your leg just below the knee? A bit extreme, eh? That's how this proposed law feels to me. 

Parents should rightly refrain from smoking in the car when children or anyone who objects is present out of compassion and courtesy. My problem is that they want to enforce it by threats of punishment. This should be advisory only. Bearing in mind that smoking goes hand in hand with rebellion I think this is yet another Labour big brother law that will do nothing to prevent somebody who already has an ignorant and selfish attitude to life. How many people do you see talking on handheld mobile phones whilst driving even though it is supposedly banned and illegal?

I remember when they banned smoking in pubs we were told that they did it in Ireland and business wasn't affected. We all said pubs would close and they said no they wouldn't. Who is right now?

If they allow these types of laws to go through eventually we will be living in an Orwellian surveillance state where there will be CCTV set up in all homes with children living there. Faceless operatives will monitor everything we do at home and vet it against government guidelines. They will promote the policy on TV saying things like:

"CCTV has been proven to be one of the best sources of evidence in recent times."

"Remember folks: CCTV footage can also exonerate you from alleged crimes so it makes perfect sense to have your home monitored by our team of experts."

"If this policy saves one life it'll be worth it." - This most damaging and nonsensical phrase would then be switched back on to any protesters with this straw man argument:

"...so you are happy to see children being abused and wives beaten with their assailants getting away with it are you?? Answer me!! Are you in favour of domestic violence? Yes or no!!?!?!"


Soon there will be soundbites on television news of ordinary apathetic voters who have gotten used to their cameras in their homes. "Well, it was kinda weird at first but now we hardly notice it. Besides, if you don't do anything wrong you've got nothing to hide, have you?"

Get yourself a copy of 1984 and read it because that is where a centre left government will take you. George Orwell had a decent stab at the date but he is a lot closer to the truth than you may think.