Nothing to do with the Smoking Ban, No of Course Not?
LONDON (Reuters) - Rank Group (LSE: 514313.L - news) warned annual operating profits would be "significantly" below that of last year due to tough trading conditions at its bingo and casino operations, knocking its shares by over 21 percent.
"While the recent trading difficulties affecting our UK retail businesses are worse than we had anticipated, we understand that they are shared by the broader UK bingo club and casino markets and are not unique to Rank," it said in a trading update on Friday.
The company said after an encouraging start to the second half of its financial year its retail business -- Mecca Bingo and Grosvenor Casinos -- had seen a "significant deterioration" in revenue in recent weeks
Deal i do believe Brown and Labour want to see the death of traditional pubs they seem only to support the large Pubcos that service the young and encourage binge drinking 24 hrs a day.
Extract from todays Daily Express ( City & Business ).
By Andrew Johnson.
RANK'S PROFITS FEEL HEAT OF SMOKE BAN.
" The owner of Mecca Bingo and Grosvenor Casinos stunned the City yesterday with a profits warning. Rank Groups shares plunged 21.4 per cent to 125p, wiping more than £133million off its market value, as it revealed a " significant deterioration " in revenues during recent weeks.
Mecca Bingo's like-for-like revenues have fallen 19 per cent in the past five weeks, while Grosvenor Casino's were down 9 per cent.
The company blamed its woes on the English smoking ban introduced in July and the removal of slot machines with £500 jackpot prizes outlawed by the new Gambling Act which became operative on September 1.
"Should the disappointing levels of recent weeks trading continue through to the end of the year, then group operating profits will be significantly lower than 2006" the company said in a statement.
Operating profits fell from £90.5million to £77.4million last year. The revelations contrasted with a relatively upbeat assessment of the company's prospects in half-year results published at the end of August and raised questions about the management's credibility.
In its statement , Rank said the removal of the " highly popular " £500 jackpot machines had compounded the smoking ban's " negative effects".
Revenues in England and Wales had dropped 22 per cent since the beginning of September. It was believed around half of this was due to the smoking ban and half to the removal of the slot machines.
The number of people visiting Mecca clubs fell by 13 per cent, with the spending per head down 7 per cent. Grosvenor admissions had fallen by 1 per cent and spending 8 per cent.
This is also an excellent article, the conclusion being
"Why does society allow this type of injustice happen? Because you as an individual do nothing. To paraphrase a popular saying; for injustice to occur all that is needed is for good people to do nothing. If it is ok with you that smokers are being punished for their actions then do not complain when it is your turn."
Good Grief Donnie, debate on Digital Spy. Smoking, next Drinking Ban. They have a point, with ID Cards, they would be able to see how much Alcohol is consumed by us, and limit us
Following on from that this article sums it up for me, you just cannot ignore air pollution, in particular diesel fumes but they will never admit it.
"Professor Virginia Berridge of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine's History Unit has researched papers relating to cabinet committee meetings in the late '50s looking into smoking, air pollution and lung cancer. She asserts that although there were clear political reasons for obscuring the link between air pollution and lung cancer, other factors, including a shifting public health agenda, which focused on an individual¹s responsibility for their health rather then environmental influences, were also key in ensuring that the issue of air pollution was 'damped down'."
http://tinyurl.com/2bxoeu
Smoking causes everything according to these people, from a wart on the end of your nose, to a blister on your foot.
Canvas thats interesting about Nick Clegg seeing as the Lib Dems voted for this spiteful vindictive ban when Charlie the smoker was in charge.
Its not Smoking that causes Lung Problems, its Popcorn
Quote from Junk Email
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Canvas, didnt manage to catch it on BBC news 24 - pity
However this article sums up what our society may become in the future - excellent reading.
"There may come a time - and sooner rather than later if one police chief gets his way - when smokers being led from public bars by the riot cops will pass on their way out other patrons perfectly legally shooting up heroin".
"If the Government wanted to do something serious about smoking it would ban cigarettes. Full stop. But that would mean foregoing the lucrative tax it raises from ciggies. So the legislation instead is about where you can smoke, not whether you can smoke. The Government merely moved the ashtrays.
But while the weed is being re-routed to the 'outdoor smoking area', we're now, thanks to Mr Brunstrom, debating whether Class A drugs should be brought in from the cold. "
Perhaps we had better change from one weed to another!
Watch out, drinkers ... the puritans are after you
As a man who has been trying to give up smoking for 20 years, it gives me no pleasure to say "I told you so". ( Actually it does, but less pleasure than a cigarette.) I will confine myself to reminding you that you were warned. That when you coughed and flapped the smoke away like a bronchitic seagull, when you shoved us out on to your sodden patio, we did point to your overflowing glass and over-stuffed wine rack and say that the puritans wouldn't stop at us.
First they'll come for the smokers, then they'll come for the drinkers. First they will ban smoking in pubs, then they will ban drinking in pubs.
And not just binge drinking. Not the drinking that leads to murder and cirrhosis of liver but any drinking beyond a miserly sip.
Canvas thats an excellent article and how true, hes probably right think the puritans are on a mission to close the pubs, first the cigs, then the drink, and lets not forget the food you can eat there!
I find this news report truly shocking that an organisation namely the NHS a supposedly caring organisation could treat the mentally ill like this and the staff that have to care for them. These are vulnerable fragile people being subjected to the worst kind of bullying – what has this country been reduced to when it picks on the most vulnerable in our society. In a lot of cases these places are peoples homes, I think it is absolutely inhuman
SMOKING BAN 'RAISES RISKS' FOR MENTAL HEALTH WORKERS
The Do-Gooders sip mineral water
And sit eating their protein pills
In rooms that were once filled with drinkers
And smokers who bore no-one ill
The Pubs They Are a Closin’
Cos the Health Fascists have got their way
But we need the Freedom to Be Ourselves
Whatever the do-gooders say
So don’t go outside your front door
Cos its all too much of a risk
You might breathe in somebody’s car fumes
Or you might just go and slip a disc
Yes, The Pubs They Are a Closin’
Cos the Health Fascists have got their way
But we need the Freedom to be Ourselves
Whatever the killjoys may say
Don’t give us anymore wine bars
We want the traditional pub
Where people are smokin’ and drinkin’
And Eating traditional grub
Yes , The Pubs They Are a changin’
Cos the Health Fascists have got their way
But we need the Freedom To Choose ourselves
People can decide things for themselves
We need the Freedom to be ourselves
Whatever the do-gooders say
And owner Austen Davies says The Centurion Inn, at Walton, is uncertain as to whether the pub will re-open as the new smoking ban has all but killed his trade.
Deal - An excellent piece by Simon Jenkins The Times – a must read
You’re better safe than free - the mantra of the Whitehall Taliban
"In America last Thursday, Tony Blair, our former prime minister, demanded vigilance against what he portrayed as a “fascist” Iranian assault on western values. These values he listed vaguely as “liberty, democracy, freedom of speech and thought"
How dare Blair talk about liberty when he removed mine and millions of others like me from using a perfectly legal product in a PRIVATELY owned place namely the Pub – the man is a disgrace he dosent know the meaning of the word liberty unless it applies to him.
"In America last Thursday, Tony Blair, our former prime minister, demanded vigilance against what he portrayed as a “fascist” Iranian assault on western values. These values he listed vaguely as “liberty, democracy, freedom of speech and thought"
Blair reminds me of Tony Benn, Preaches one thing in Goverment, and is against it when out of Goverment!
Deal read this link below and save the document to your PC - this reveals every lie told by anti smokers, every lie that naive MP's fell for, even someone that dosent understand maths can understand this in laymans terms.
Deal/Canvas it appears that at last some people are waking up to what is happening and why so many people think science is now junk.
Abstract
This commentary accompanies two articles submitted to Epidemiologic Perspectives & Innovations in response to a call for papers about threats to epidemiology or epidemiologists from organized political interests. Contrary to our expectations, we received no submissions that described threats from industry or government; all were about threats from anti-tobacco activists. The two we published, by James E. Enstrom and Michael Siegel, both deal with the issue of environmental tobacco smoke. This commentary adds a third story of attacks on legitimate science by anti-tobacco activists,
the author's own experience. These stories suggest a willingness of influential antitobacco activists, including academics, to hurt legitimate scientists and turn epidemiology into junk science in order to further their agendas. The willingness of epidemiologists embrace such anti-scientific influences bodes ill for the field's reputation as a legitimate science.
http://tinyurl.com/2vnu6d
If they are prepared to lie to obtain their objectives then it is obvious that people will no longer believe in the credibility of science and just refer to it as junk.
Agree, 1 July was the day that democracy died. On the Freedom2choose site, a member has reproduced in full the letter received from the Conservative office about the smoking ban. It points mainly to the 'government dept. on health' (oh?) and says that 'there has been public pressure for some time to ban smoking in enclosed public places'. I would like to ask two questions:
1. By what right does the Conservative party endorse Labour's betrayal of their manifesto promise to give a partial ban only? Which they have endorsed fully.
2. By what right does the Conservative party and DC assume
to know in blanket terms that 'the public have for a long time pressed for a ban on smoking in enclosed places'.
Even if the latter were provable, it has not been put to the vote democratically. A labour manifesto pledge has been broken; it has not been fully debated in Parliament - that is to say, segregated areas, full air conditioning, areas without staff; the economic effects on pub closures and the closing of bingo halls (yes, they do matter!) - none of those elements have been properly debated, or voted on by the people. Once again, our MPs have rolled over with their paws in the air, and sacrificed the democratic freedom of 12million people in this country.
Makes a joke of two world wars and all that loss of life. Any MP that voted for this ban should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves and aware of the repercussions - as we take a further step towards a nazi mentality, beloved of small minds and anal control freaks. Oh, do be worried - because there is a growing swell of people who are utterly sick of it, genuinely concerned, who have access to informed debate and other scientific views, and who are not being heard.
We might do well to recall Peter Finch in 'Network' - 'Get up out of your seats, go to the window, and say "I'm not going to take it any more"'. It's coming and in fact, for some of us, it is very much here. How do we vote? Wait and see but you ignore 12m people at your own risk David. You also sacrifice potentially 12m votes or a good part of them.
It only needs one statement in favour of pro-choice and common sense. Hardly rocket science.
And then you have good old Dave C having his hissy fit when questioned about his pot smoking days saying if he wanted to have a life that was his business - well some of us would like to live our lives the way we want it too. He gave the impression that he was in favour of choice but of course when it comes down to it choices are basically there to be limited!
The entrance to The Pack Horse, on the A4074 Woodcote Road, has been daubed with the message “Very sorry we are closed. Thanks Labour + smoking ban” after it closed its doors earlier this month.
Last month the Evening Post reported many pubs felt the introduction of the smoking ban in July had caused takings to nosedive.
Speaking then, Paul Foster, landlord of the Brewery Tap in Castle Street, said: “We have had a bad summer in terms of weather, but the smoking ban has caused this hit on profits. Lots of people haven’t been out for months – they stay at home with a bottle of wine instead.”
http://tinyurl.com/yo9q2b
yaosxx - politicians are it would appear to me of the mode "do as I say not as I do" hyprocricy at its worst - I thought David Cameron would be different but it would appear not!
"I am sorry to have to inform everyone that the great British pub is in even more serious decline than is apparently evident, due to interfering law makers."
"The simple reason the bar was deserted was because everyone was outside having a smoke.
The majority of the anti-smoking zealots visit boozers about as often as the Queen has a baby, and frequent trendy wine bars and other so-called class establishments, as is their prerogative."
Deal, I have just joined awaiting confirmation e-mail, perhaps they would like to hear from a few publicans as well! - Donnie - Be with you as soon as I can.
This peer-reviewed article was published immediately upon acceptance. It can be downloaded, printed and distributed freely for any purposes (see copyright notice below).
Warning: Anti-tobacco activism may be hazardous to epidemiologic science
Abstract
This commentary accompanies two articles submitted to Epidemiologic Perspectives & Innovations in response to a call for papers about threats to epidemiology or epidemiologists from organized political interests. Contrary to our expectations, we received no submissions that described threats from industry or government; all were about threats from anti-tobacco activists. The two we published, by James E. Enstrom and Michael Siegel, both deal with the issue of environmental tobacco smoke. This commentary adds a third story of attacks on legitimate science by anti-tobacco activists,
the author's own experience. These stories suggest a willingness of influential antitobacco activists, including academics, to hurt legitimate scientists and turn epidemiology into junk science in order to further their agendas. The willingness of epidemiologists embrace such anti-scientific influences bodes ill for the field's reputation as a legitimate science.
By the way if you take a look at the "SCOTH" report the findings of which was claimed by politicians as providing overwhelming evidence of the need for a Smoking Ban then look at the SCOTH Committee. On the Committee you will find two members are Directors of ASH U.K and all but two members have direct links back to the pharmaceutical industry – so was the SCOTH Report truly unbiased and credible I think not - just a stitch up.
Can someone please tell me, when the Law was changed; that made it legal for Children to go into Pubs. I understand that now Families/Kids can go into a Pub for a Meal?
When you read it, it makes a mockery in my opinion of kids and drink. For instance if a 17yr old went to the off license for a bottle of wine he would be refused, but if he goes for a meal at the pub with parents he can drink wine! - work that one out
On BBC 5 Live the other night.............. Plans are being drawn up............. Where you will need a.....................Licence to Smoke...........available from your ..............GP?
Yes, I heard about this, well they realy do want to increase smuggling dont they, thick or what Duh
Apparently this was originally suggested by one of Blairs cronies (think tank) these people just dont live in the real world at all.
and on the question of transplants the discussion we were having on another thread this makes interesting reading
"We've all seen photos of "smoker's lungs"... disgusting and black, enough to scare the bejeebers out of many people. One small problem... they weren't photos of smoker's lungs, but photos of cancerous lungs... lungs that could just as easily have been from non-smokers. Medical examiners cannot tell a smoker's lung from a non-smoker's lung. Smokers' lungs are regularly transplanted, a real indication of the truth.
Like I have said before SHS is the biggest scam going. What have anti tobbaco taliban achieved, they have pushed smoking into the home. People are now buying in from the supermarket or off license and staying at home where they have a smoke with their drink in peace - of course the next argument will be the children you see if I am not right. they have got away with trampling over publicans private property rights, next they will come after you in your home and car - well over my dead body they wont set foot in my home.
Correct Deal, the thing is if you are a smoker why on earth would you want to turn out on a cold wet dark night to go down the local to be put outside and treated like a dog, people are just not going to do it not in the winter anyway and we have now entered Oct to March dark nights. All a pub will be fit for soon will be to stuff your face and listen to kids arguing about what they want to eat, not my kind of pub.
Here is an excellent piece from the freedom2choose.info site which was in The Independent and written by Tim Luckhurst.
Says it all realy
When I interviewed her in 2004, Amanda Sandford of Ash acknowledged unintentionally that much secondary smoking science is unscientific. She said: "A lot of the studies that have been done on passive smoking produce results that are not statistically significant according to conventional analysis." In plain English, that means that if secondary smoking were not already the focus of a torrent of moral sanctimony, few reputable scientists would dare to assert that it causes lung cancer, heart disease or any of the other life-threatening conditions with which it is routinely associated.
Dr Ken Denson, a medical professional who is prepared say what others only think, puts it more bluntly: "The ill effects of passive smoking are still intuition rather than scientific fact... All in all, the medical evidence for any deleterious effect of passive smoking is extremely tenuous and it is unlikely that it would ever stand up in a court of law."
Like I have previously said one big scam by the Anti Tobbaco brigade, led by ASH, who are government funded and who have members on the Board of SCOTH - lies, deceipt, immoral, junk science paraded by people that wish to remove anothers freedom to do something perfectly legal because they disapprove of what they are doing.
http://www.freedom2choose.info/news1.php?id=393
I repeat no other group of people in this country who are doing nothing illegal have been denied the right to their own club staffed by smokers or non smokers that dont mind smoking - that is not democracy its dictatorship. Its WRONG WRONG WRONG to say that non smokers can have as many venues as they wish to meet in but smokers cannot have one - its blatant discrimination of the worst kind.
