Smoking Ban Loophole!

The Smoking Ban has long been kicked about the Brewery as one of the reasons we, as a start-up Microbrewery, have seen a decline in the entire sector of beer sales: while Andy may celebrate that he can enjoy his pint in a smoke-free atmosphere (and I would be the first to admit that, like it or hate it, the smell of smoke in the pub was one of the primary things I associated with walking in one of the places) we both agree that taking freedom of choice out of the matter was not perhaps the wisest of moves.

We suspect The Government (in their wisdom) has it in for the English Pub and centre of community, and wish to fracture what community we have; next perhaps we will have retina scans to enter places where one may enjoy oneself so only ‘registered self-indulgers’ can frequent… I digress it seems. Nonetheless, it warms the cockles of my heart to hear there were people legally side-stepping the ban by establishing a place of Research in their Establishment, and taking surveys of every participant! To hear it from their mouths it has “given business a shot in the arm”. The best link I found on the subject was the Daily Mail’s story found here which says she may well be in for prosecution as her establishment may not fulfil the criteria for a ‘Research Centre’. If she is fulfilling the criteria set out however, and perhaps publishing the data she is collecting; whether in analysis, aggregate or raw data form, how is she any less valid a researcher than any other surveyer? Is not the role of the data collector in scientific research the most vital, but can yet be collected as validly by a publican as any by other individual? Though the data collected through the survey may be biased, is that bias itself not a worthy area of study? Data has weight through volume. This is a survey carried out on a (so far indeterminate though rising) number of individuals in Barnsley. I propose that research like this should be carried out in every public house in the land whose patrons and management would support such a move, and that surveys should be given to the non-smoking patrons as well, to establish other datas. This has, of course, the consequence of exposing more data to the world on the habits of pub-goers: anonymised, as one would hope such studies would be, this may not be a particularly bad consequence. The world of hope, eh!