Letters to the Editor | 25 February 2006

Jackboots of New Labour

From Philip Freeman
Sir: I expected a more robust defence of our liberty from the Spectator (Leading article, 18 February). Just because a majority of the snivelling puritans who populate Parliament today voted for the smoking ban does not mean we should shrug our shoulders and accept it meekly. Individual freedom and liberty are more important than democracry, which is more like mob rule in this country.

I am a committed non-smoker, but I have a quaint belief in ‘live-and-let-live’. What’s it got to do with me if somebody smokes in a pub? I’ll go elsewhere if necessary. Are we really going to tell a war veteran that he may no longer smoke in his British Legion club?

I seem to be part of a dwindling band who still believe in the right of individuals to make their own choices without wholesale interference from the state. This Act is just the latest in a long line of demoralising, authoritarian measures by this government. But most depressing to me is the servile acceptance — even welcome — given to all of this by the British population. We now seem to be a people divided into those completely institutionalised under the jackboot of New Labour and those who positively enjoy destroying the pleasures of others.
Philip Freeman
Harrow, Middlesex

From Michael Grenfell
Sir: In your Leading article you write, ‘Our instincts may be libertarian, but they are also democratic, and if we are forced to choose between the two, we are obliged to concede that the anti-smoking majority must have its way.’ Replace the word ‘smoking’ in that sentence with ‘Jewish’ and the logic of your position comes close to a justification for the (democratically elected) Nazi regime in Germany, your ‘libertarian’ instincts notwithstanding.