Dramatic change in UK spending habits shows the decline of smoking

If the key to a nation's priorities lies in its shopping lists, then Britain has been transformed in 50 years from a society spending mainly on basic food and warmth to one transfixed by the delights of leisure and travel, new figures show.

The usually stern face of official government statistics softened yesterday to offer an anniversary glimpse of family spending habits in 1957, the year an annual household expenditure survey was first launched in a post-ration book Britain.

The contrasts are telling. Five decades ago families were spending a third of their income on food, non-alcoholic drinks, cigarettes and bus fares. That proportion has dropped to just 15% in today's era of cheap food.

The lists of the top 50 commodities and services for households then and now offers a rare window on life in 1950s Britain, and on the significant changes in priorities since then.

Cigarettes have fallen from an astonishing second place, burning up 5.6% of weekly expenditure, to 30th place, at less than 1%.

The 2006 survey, published later than usual due to a change in the way the ONS gathers statistics, also reveals UK households spent an average of £456 a week during 2006, up from £443 in 2005/6.

Source: The Guardian, 29 November 2008
Link: http://tinyurl.com/3x2qdv

165,000 smokers quit following the introduction of the smoking ban

Figures from the Information Centre for Health and Social Care, which collects statistics on behalf of the Health Service found that almost 165,000 smokers managed to give up around the time of the smoking ban last July, a rise of a more than a quarter on the previous year.

More than nine million British adults still smoke, but research has shown that the proportion has fallen from 24 to 22 per cent of the population. 

The figures revealed that the number of smokers in England setting a quit date with NHS Smoking Services between April and September 2007 was 29 per cent higher than in the same period the previous year.

Those who were still cigarette free at a follow-up appointment four weeks later also rose by 28 per cent.

Smokers who quit without seeking help from the service were not included in the figures. 

Research has shown that bar and pub workers are already beginning to feel the health benefits from the smoking ban which came into force last July.

Doctors hope that the reduction in the number of English smokers will be mirrored by a drop in heart attacks, as has already happened in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Of those attending stop smoking services, three-quarters received nicotine replacement therapy from the NHS, a further 10 per cent received the drug Champix, the most successful anti-smoking aid, while 4 per cent used the drug Zyban.

The cost of the services per quitter was £164, compared with £181 during the same period in 2006.

Tim Straughan, chief executive of the Information Centre for Health and Social Care, said this research provides the first feedback since the smoking ban was introduced.

He added, "It shows more and more smokers are accessing NHS Stop Smoking Services and many of these are successfully kicking the habit."

Source: Daily Mail, 29 January 2008
Link: http://tinyurl.com/36c6gx

First pub landlord charged with refusing to enforce smoking ban hit with £10,000 fine

A landlord has been issued a £10,000 legal bill after he became the first publican in Britain to go on trial accused of flouting the smoking ban.

Nick Hogan, 40, was summoned to court after repeatedly allowing his customers to smoke.  

One of his regulars, Gerard Hart, 47, was the first person to be prosecuted under the new legislation when he was caught smoking in one of Hogan's pubs in October last year.

Hogan denied breaking the law by claiming he had advised his regulars about the ban and had left it up to them to decide whether to smoke or not.

But a district judge dismissed his explanation and found him guilty of flagrant breaches of the legislation, which was introduced in July last year.

He fined Hogan £3,000 and ordered him to pay £7,236 in costs after finding him guilty of four charges of failing to prevent people from smoking in his pubs under the Health Act 2006.

Judge Tim Devas, sitting at Bolton magistrates court, said: "It was flagrant breach of the law."

"It seems to me that the legislation leaves no doubt that it is not sufficient for someone to merely give people a choice, and to tell them that what they do is their choice."

"The landlord took steps to inform his customers as to the law, but made it clear as to his stance and he did not take reasonable steps to cause persons smoking to stop."

Hogan, who ran two pubs in Bolton, Greater Manchester, is the first landlord to be convicted of breaking the ban after challenging the new smoking laws.

He  said he was considering an appeal and vowed to continue fighting the legislation which he branded "draconian."

Hogan, himself a smoker said, "This was not just about smoking, it was about people's rights."

"This legislation is unworkable and discriminatory. I'm not pro-smoking, but I am pro-choice. I have respect for the law, but I have no respect for an unfair law."

Source: thisislondon.co.uk, 30 January 2008
Link: http://tinyurl.com/358nt7

Imperial Tobacco Says U.K., German Markets Shrank

Imperial Tobacco Group Plc, Europe's second-largest cigarette maker, said the U.K. and German tobacco markets shrank last year following the smoking ban in England and tax increases in Germany.

The Bristol based company said that Britain's market contracted 4 percent by volume in the 12 months to December and business this financial year remains in line with expectations, with earnings, shipments and market share rises in many markets in its first quarter.

Imperial Tobacco accounts for almost half of the British market and about a fifth of that in Germany, where the tobacco market declined 6 percent. The company this month finished buying Altadis SA, the Spanish maker of Gauloises cigarettes, for 12.6 billion euros to reduce its reliance on those shrinking markets.

Charles Manso, a  Dresdner Kleinwort analyst said, "This market fall is not out of kilter given it's the first six months after a smoking ban. The general tobacco pricing environment remains firm, underpinned by industry consolidation.''

Cigarette makers based in western Europe have bought rivals to add to their market share and expanded outside the region as governments toughen smoking restrictions. Indoor smoking in public places was banned across the U.K. last July, France prohibited smoking in cafes, hotels and clubs at the start of this year and six German states widened bans. 

Imperial Tobacco may bid for Turkish cigarette maker Tekel, Chief Executive Officer Gareth Davis said last week. Turkey's government is trying to sell Tekel for the third time after drawing no bids in a 2005 effort. More than three-fifths of adult Turkish males smoke, compared with fewer than a third in the U.K.

Source: Bloomberg, 29 January 2008  
Link: http://tinyurl.com/2t66am