Hotmao

There used to be an awesome party in Cornwall. Just before Christmas young teens got dressed up in black tie or woeful party frocks and hit the Headland Hotel in Newquay to get drunk and fall over. All The while a group of parents sensibly hid next door waiting to throw the little darlings back into their carriages at 2am. 

Then those bastards from Pony Club turned up.

Suddenly those sensible parents became “concerned” parents who felt there weren’t quite enough rules in place to manage these children. Soon an unlimited bar became a quarter of a bottle of wine to keep you going for 4 hours. Shirts had to be tucked in, a peck on the face was as far as you could go and smoking got banned (probably see where this is going here).

I only say this because now those bastards have finished with the SnowBall, they have taken their penchant for petty rules nationally and appear to be employed by Action on Smoking and Health.

“There are no exceptions,” berates Amanda Sandford, their spokeswoman. “This isn’t covered by artistic integrity,” she shrieks.

The piece of artistry in question this time, is James May and Jeremy Clarkson lighting up pipes in front of an audience at their Top Gear studio. And keeping with those Pony Club credentials ASH wants those naughty boys to say sorry, “Smoking in a studio is illegal. We would hope the programme-makers make some form of apology.”

Thanks in part to zealots forming groups like ASH, I’m not even sure smoking is allowed even when it is integral to one’s art. Mel Smith had a bugger of a time with it playing Churchill at the Edinburgh festival last year and the snoopers even got on Rolling Stones’ case at a recent concert and I would say Keith and fags are pretty damn integral.

The fact that not one out of the 23000 audience at the O2 Arena complained or that out of Top Gear’s worldwide audience of several million the BBC received just two does sort of indicate that no one was overly bothered. However the Pony Club extremists have invested so much energy in getting their petty rules made law, and as with the drunken teenagers in Cornwall, Sandford and her friends must protect us from ourselves on the off chance that lighting up one cigarette in an area the size of the Millennium Dome might kill us all.

Just to point out – we know that smoking kills. We know it kills a lot. We’re not sure about passive smoking although it stands to reason despite the fact that numerous studies funded by ASH amongst others haven’t come up with any credible evidence. Most people are certainly happy to accept it’s an irritating habit and should not be forced on others. Which is why last year we had the perfect compromise to deal with this situation: An exemption on private members clubs, pubs which didn’t serve food and I’m guessing probably artistic integrity too.

Instead, thanks to Sandford and ASH we get this ludicrous smoking ban where a bus stop is deemed an enclosed space, in bars you have to make the choice whether going for a cig is worth getting your drink spiked, and where the Stones now look rebellious for ingesting legal drugs.