I literally saw the man put the cigarette to his lips and inhale. My distress at this flagrant infringement of my human rights can only be imagined.
So I was thrilled to learn that new PM Keir Starmer is planning a total ban on smoking outdoors. Now he’s made a start, there’s a lot more he should do.
When I went to the bar I was horrified to find the pub was full of people openly drinking alcohol. I found it very triggering.
Alcohol is known to cause arguments and violence, possibly even more than smoking. Starmer needs to make pubs safe spaces for everyone and BAN drinking beer, wine and spirits in them.
Labour justified the the outdoors smoking ban by saying it would ease the strain on the NHS. By that logic, there’s a much stronger case for banning drinking.
Smoking costs the NHS £2.5billion a year. Alcohol costs it £3.5 billion.
Pub drinking has to stop. Now.
Starmer shouldn’t stop there. He must go further to challenge systemic injustice and support marginalised communities.
Everyone agrees that NHS waiting lists are far too long. There’s an obvious solution, as put forward by Labour MP Jess Phillips.
Phillips reportedly suggested she recently got preferential hospital treatment because she backed a Gaza ceasefire in a crunch Commons vote.
This helped speed up her care when a Palestinian doctor treated her during a visit to a Birmingham hospital.
This innovative secondary care triage system must be extended.
Every NHS patient should be questioned on their political views, and those who give wrong answers on issues such as the Middle East and trans rights should be denied care.
That would slash waiting lists to just a few hundred thousands overnight.
Let’s call it the “Phillips principal”. Once it has been set, it will have endless uses.
Instead of basing state pension entitlement on national insurance contributions, it should be calculated according to how many left-wing protest marches retirees attended during their working lifetime.
Somebody who has been on, say, 35 qualifying marches would get the full state pension. Less than 10 and they wouldn’t get a penny.
So few people would claim the state pension that even the incompetent Department for Work and Pensions might be able to run it.
Many are worried about the autumn Budget on October 30, where Reeves is expected to increase tax on capital gains, but that’s not enough. Instead, she should ban capital gains altogether.
Entrepreneurs, investors and landlords can’t expect to continue making money under a Labour government.
Making capital gains for your own personal use is a micro-aggression that demeans and marginalises anybody who can’t be bothered to do it themselves.
It has to stop.
By the same token, Labour should ban inheritances. And it MUST axe private sector pensions, with the savings directed towards the public sector whose pensions are only about five times bigger.
Over time, Starmer should ban the private sector altogether. As a self-proclaimed socialist, he’d be a hypocrite not to.
These far-sighted policies would close chancellor Rachel Reeves’ £22billion black hole with enough left over to give the rail unions a pay rise every week.
There are plenty more things Labour should ban, but I should probably stop. Starmer might actually take some of these ideas seriously.
