The Government's persecution of smokers, a reflection of our dying right to free choice?

I am a non-smoker, some might argue the worst type, a reformed puffer, down from 40 a day to none in one hit with not so much as a drag since for nine years.

However I was horrified by the chancellor’s decision to slap 37p on the price of a packet of fags in this week’s  Budget.

What does that make a pack of 20 now? – nudging £10 ish? I remember scratching round student digs in the early 90s looking for £2.00 to buy 20 Rothmans, and I thought that was steep.

I happen to think the constant persecution of smokers is nothing less than villainous.

I know, as an ex-addict I should be coughing and spluttering every time a whiff of smoke drifts in my direction, shielding children from anyone with a Marlborough Light who comes within 100 metres.

Well, I don’t. Nor do I agree with the ban on smoking in pubs, restaurants or other shared places –  “shared” being the operative word.

As well as being an ex-smoker, I am also vehemently pro-choice. 

Choice, and our freedom to choose and accept the consequences of our choices, forms the basis our democratic society, but slowly this fundamental right is drip-dripping between our fingers, and it’s happening without us even noticing.

My answer to Mr Osborne’s justification of this whopping tobacco tax being  it will encourage people to stop smoking while discouraging others from starting is – for God’s sake, Mind Your Own Business.

The only objection I have ever had to smokers is when they  expect taxpayer’s to fund their habit, and yes, I am talking about the benefits mob.

But for every other hard working British adult who chooses to smoke, let them if they want to.

I feel the same about alcohol, even though again, I don’t touch the stuff, and drugs.

We're told what we can eat, whether we can put salt on our food, how much water we can use, what days and between what hours we can go shopping, and gradually our every move is being picked up and recorded on camera.

Rather than nannying and making moral judgements, the Government should give the facts and allow people to make their own choice.

My only caveat would be that as a responsible adult you make your choice, but you take the consequences without expecting the state to step in if it goes wrong.

Take this ridiculous, America-appeasing prohibition of the Cannabis plant, dressed up under the pretense of being in the best interests of the country.

No it’s not. It has nothing to do with that. We all know it has to do with protecting the profits of drug companies which are in the pockets of those who pull the strings.

I know, when I see pictures of policemen in the newspaper, with dogs, and vans proudly filling bags with seized plants proclaiming the streets are safer as a result, that they are talking absolute rubbish.

If anything, every confiscated bag of home-grown hemp puts money straight into the pockets of the dealers who rely on the efforts of the legal system to keep the cash flowing in.

The cost of this social manipulation is we are gradually losing our right to make choices.

This latest penalty placed on smokers came with a terrifying sweetener - “trust us, it’s for your own good”.

I do, and always have thought I would be on very dangerous ground to  believe without question a Government has my best interests at heart.

It doesn’t, it has its own, we just follow.

So how do you get round this crippling tax on cigarettes? Well it’s simple really you can’t. 

If you buy them abroad where they are ten times cheaper you either have to smuggle them in or pay the duty at customs.

If you get caught you face huge fines and even risk going to prison, yes, I know, I know – it’s for our own good.

Smokers are also warned of buying cheap cigarettes under the counter, as these are of poor quality and “bad for your health”.

I actually heard a policeman say that once, I don’t think he got  his own unintended joke.

Of course the safest way to smoke, to your health and liberty, is to buy from the Government, and let them take their whopping cut.

I gave up smoking because I had had enough of it, pure and simple.

But I would defend anyone’s  right to make their choice on the matter. In fact my advice is grow your own, until they make that illegal.

Social control is creeping slowly and quietly into our lives - soaring taxes, substance prohibition and speed cameras to name just a few.

We haven’t even got to DNA profiling, ID cards and curfews, I believe they just around the corner.