First off, a confession: I smoke, and do so a lot when I go fishing. I don't like the fact that I smoke, and if I can I'll give up (just not today ...). And I've no problem with people, especially kids, being discouraged from smoking. I'd even go along with smoking being banned at any youth events (angling competitions included). But ...SMOKING WILL be banned in public parks, on beaches and boardwalks and in sportsgrounds, if the Minister for Health has his way.
At a conference hosted by the Irish Heart Foundation yesterday, James Reilly said he wanted to “go a step further” than banning smoking in cars with children.
“It is essential that we denormalise smoking,” Dr Reilly said.
“We are getting more support for my plans to ban smoking in cars, but I would like to go further. I would like to do what they’ve done in New York, where smoking is banned in parks and on beaches, where children are likely to be and observe behaviour, because that is where they are and they learn what ‘big’ people do. So, I certainly intend to pursue that at Cabinet.”
If society was determined to tackle issues such as smoking and obesity, “we need to take the critics head on and take the action that is required”.
Those determined to improve the nation’s health must reject the accusations of those, many with vested interests, that the State was behaving as a “nanny state,” Dr Reilly said. “The State has a duty of care to its citizens.”
I deeply resent any government goon outfit deciding that they know better than me when it comes to actions that affect no one but myself. In a pub? Yes, the staff are affected, so bad luck for me. Bit a bucking feach? You'd need to travel to the moon to find an environment where fag smoke is less likely to impact on anyone. Even if you flick a mountain of fag butts into the tide (which I don't advocate), the things are biodegradable and decay within days. Another stroke of genius involves banning smoking in cars for the protection of children. Not necessarily cars with children in them, mind--cars in general. Sure, you'll never bate those kids: climbing in and out of cars all the while, without the drivers even knowing they're inside. It only makes sense to ban the smoking for the kids' sake, just in case fifteen of them are hiding behind the driver's seat and you never saw them get in. Less a stroke of genius than just a stroke, if you ask me.
So, I cordially invite gardaí, power freaks and members of the general public who don't know a civil liberty from a civil request to go ***k yourself to arrest me when I light up on the beach. All they'll have to do is find the cliff path, get the right state of the tide, cross the waist-deep stream, hop over fifty-odd jagged rocks and they might find me.
Only by then, I'll probably have packed up and gone back to the car, where I'll be enjoying one of Cuba's finest ...
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, well if you were tired of living you would.
but if the school couldent stop you behind the bike shed 
and can be easily inforced by a park warden or council employee with a camera.and have them working on commission and so goes another one of our basic rights.when the litter laws for chewing gum and cigerette butts was passed no one thought it was inforcable. i was done about two weeks after it was passed. dropped a cigerette butt out the window of the car in traffic and a letter to the house fixed fine of 150 euros.not one to take it lying down i rang the office gave my details.the nice lady told me we can go to court but we have the cigerette butt with your dna on it. if you go to court and its proved its your butt you pay all the costs for the dna test which stood at 2000.they also use traffic cameras at lights .it turned out in my case the litter warden was standing on the pavement beside my car when i dropped it.and took photos of my reg and of the butt smoldering on the road and i dident see a bit of him
