Janet Street-Poter: We'll all have to cough up for Dave's betrayal on booze 'n' fags

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Man of the moment Nigel Farage proudly lights up at every opportunity as if he’s exercising a basic human right.

Holding a pint for photographers he’s cleverly using these props to reinforce his image as an ‘ordinary’ chap. Nigel’s Ukip party are pro- smoking and want the law changed so pubs could welcome puffing pariahs back, with their own designated rooms.

He’s got some wealthy supporters. Tobacco manufacturers, like the alcohol industry, operate a highly sophisticated lobbying system, anxious to prevent any legislation that could impact on sales and profits. 

Nigel's Ukip party are pro- smoking and want the law changed so pubs could welcome puffing pariahs back, with their own designated rooms

They ridicule anti-smoking campaigners and trash their research. They wine and dine MPs and civil servants. Their influence is all- pervasive. Sod our health, or the cost to the NHS of liver, lung and heart disease, booze and fags must be readily available to anyone.

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David Cameron used to say he was concerned about the nation’s health and favoured minimum pricing per unit of alcohol and backed plain packaging on cigarettes.

Not any more. Cameron caved in on minimum pricing on booze a while back, and last week it emerged that planned legislation to introduce plain packaging (which would have had unpleasant images showing the medical effects of smoking and other warnings on more than 75 per cent of each wrapper) on cigarettes has been quietly dropped from the Queens speech.

The Government says it’s because they don’t want to be seen as anti-smoking. Strange this concern for the right of smokers to harm themselves coincides with poor poll results for the Tories. There’s already legislation in place restricting where smokers can puff away and the Treasury has increased tax to the level where a packet of fags is a luxury item, so we can discount the idea politicians care about our rights.

Earlier this year, the Department of Health met with lobbyists from the tobacco industry and were told that if cigarettes had to be sold in plain wrappers, the industry would probably source the packaging from abroad and there could be considerable job losses — a figure of 70,000 was mentioned. Cigarettes are already sold in plain packets in Australia.

One of the leading opponents there was Lynton Crosby, director of the Liberal party, who accepted funding from a tobacco company. Now, Mr Crosby advises the Tories on their 2015 election campaign.

When asked to spell out how plain packaging might result in so many job losses, tobacco companies say it’s commercially sensitive information.

They are worried about shareholders, not public health, as cigarette smoking in Europe continues to decline — Imperial Tobacco have just posted their first drop in profits for 17 years. 

It’s been the same climbdown over booze. A year ago, Cameron said legislation would make it illegal to sell alcohol for less than a set price per unit. A year later, he’s changed his tune — I wonder why?

The Home Office says ‘there’s strong evidence’ that increasing the price of booze will reduce consumption, ‘particularly among young people’. The booze manufacturers have spent the past 12 months with their lobbyists working flat out to get this plan scuppered.

Pubs want minimum pricing to lure customers back and stop them ‘pre-loading’ with cheap booze bought at supermarkets before they go out in the evening.

Doctors and nurses and some supermarket chains all want booze to cost more.

But the Treasury says that a reduction in sales would mean  a loss in tax revenue. I wonder who brought that to their attention?

One thing you can be sure of when politicians talk about our ‘rights’ is that what they mean is hanging on to our votes. Once again, the booze and fag  industries have scored a spectacular goal.

And we’ll be paying for the cost to the NHS, through our taxes.

  I won't be dining out on my cucumbers

The wet spring has meant my vegetable patch is about a month behind schedule, and I’ve spent this weekend filling it with starter plants rather than growing from seed.

One veg that I’ve abandoned is cucumbers. After patiently nurturing a plant for months last summer, this mini offering (right) was my only result — hardly big enough for a single sandwich!

May 12 was designated National Cucumber day — I know you had the bunting ready — but it has been postponed until 2014, probably because spring didn’t happen in time.

Never mind, if you fancy a celebration, Gordon’s have brought out a new cucumber-flavoured gin. I can ask only one question: why?

 Is money money money why Bjorn's happy?

As an Abba museum opens in Stockholm tomorrow, pity the Spice Girls. The demise of Viva Forever! — which I thought a jolly evening and not nearly as grim as the critics described — means the girls will probably never open a theme park based on their exploits.

Abba, on the other hand, have sold more than 400 million albums and Mamma Mia!, which used their songs, was a global hit on stage and a fabulous movie.

Bjorn Ulvaeus of Abba looks great for 68 and says he deals with fame by spending two hours every Tuesday in a gazebo on his private island in Sweden, talking about life and ‘existence’ with his personal existential therapist. Is this the solution to happiness in later life?

Or could having millions in the bank help, too?

 Kirstie, you're quite irritating

Last week I appeared as a guest on Channel 4’s Ten O’Clock Live, discussing the insulting notion of asking pensioners to hand back universal benefits, such as the winter fuel allowance.

I seem to have enraged Kirstie Allsopp — who mistakenly asked on Twitter why ‘Janet Street Pain in the Bum’ had replaced presenter Lauren Laverne — which I hadn’t.

Kirstie (wealthy partner, two nice homes, two housekeepers, one nanny) has been musing why there aren’t more women on TV panel shows such as QI, Mock The Week and Have I Got News For You.

I seem to have enraged Kirstie Allsopp - who mistakenly asked on Twitter why 'Janet Street Pain in the Bum' had replaced presenter Lauren Laverne - which I hadn't

According to the Queen of Craft, it’s not the fault of the programme-makers if more women aren’t brave enough to appear. She says ‘most women have more common sense than ego, and we know it is a high-risk business’.

Exactly, which is why, when I appear on programmes such Ten O’Clock Live, I can handle Twitter abuse from Kirstie!

I regularly appear on Question Time — a pleasurable experience — but I can see why many potential guests (male and female) would find it scary.

All the same, it would be good to see more women on the BBC.

After a year of grovelling to the producers of QI — a show that has been reprimanded for a lack of female faces — I have been invited to appear on ONE show in the next series. A small victory.

 

Forty years after their relationship ended, Jimmy Connors has been dropping heavy hints about why

American tennis player Jimmy Connors kisses his fiancee Chris Evert after winning the men's singles final at Wimbledon, London, 6th July 1974

he and Chris Evert called off their wedding in 1974 when they were the world’s top players. He was 22, she 19, and they had won the Wimbledon singles championships.

Connors has written a memoir in which he talks about his struggles with dyslexia, addiction to gambling and his rivalry with other players.

He seems to have offended his former fiancée by implying that when Chris (a devout Roman Catholic) found herself pregnant she chose to have an abortion against his wishes, putting her career first.

Connors says: ‘It was a horrible feeling, but I knew it was over. Getting married wasn’t going to be good for either of us.’

Isn’t it the height of bad manners to discuss this without telling your former partner?

Chris says she is ‘extremely disappointed’. Connors had a reputation for loutish behaviour and it seems he hasn’t matured much over the years. He’s certainly got no respect for her privacy.