Report to the People
8th September 2003
We Won’t Be Blown Off Course
Let’s
hear it for British eccentricity. In
what other country would two men try to launch a glorified hot air balloon from
an experimental ship and fly it into space?
And
where else would their efforts captivate the public imagination to such an
extent that it was across every news channel, morning paper and radio show?
With its mix of individual innovation, the spirit of adventure and the
determination not to let a minor detail like the balloon falling apart when you
try to inflate it get you down, it was little wonder this story struck a chord
with us.
Asides
from our expertise in hot air, politicians have something else in common with
balloonists. We both, when we’re
making progress towards our goal, run the risk of being blown off course.
It
infuriates me that, just when we’re getting to the heart of the big issues,
just when we’ve got economic regeneration and cracking down on anti-social
behaviour at the top of the political agenda, up pops some fringe figure trying
to waste our time with whatever trivial pet project someone sold them at a
dinner party over the weekend.
The
latest flight of fancy for which we’re supposed to drop everything is the
notion that the government should ban smoking in pubs.
Now,
I am by no means an advocate of smoking. It
does massive damage to our public health and I’m in favour of giving smokers
help to kick their habit. In an
ideal world no-one would touch the cancerous little sticks, but in the real one
they do. And, if they’re going to
smoke somewhere, should they do it in an environment populated solely by adults
who have chosen to be there (and no-one goes into a pub under impression that
it’s doing them good), or would it be fairer if they lit up in the living room
in which their kids are playing?
And
is any of this really up to the government?
When we have so many issues on our plate, surely we can leave this for
common sense to sort out. There’s
not exactly a lack of competition between pubs and if publicans run an
establishment which is too smoky for their customers and staff, it won’t be
long before they’re short of both.
If
we learned anything from the first four years of the Scottish Parliament, it’s
that we can’t be blown off course. We
are elected to do a job; to make streets safer and communities stronger – not
to treat the nation like children.
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