"Liberals’ hypocrisy on banning tobacco is pure class snobbery
Those calling for the legalisation of cannabis while defending Rishi Sunak’s ban on smoking cigarettes have shown their true colours"
Telegraph: 17th April 2024: [Telegraph Assistant Editor] highlights what the vote on banning smoking for future adults really tells us
Many disenchanted Tories have argued that the new lifetime ban on buying cigarettes – at least for people born after 2009 – is “unconservative”. In their fury with Rishi Sunak, however, I think they’re overlooking something. The sheer hypocrisy of so many liberals.
Take the Lib Dems. Sir Ed Davey, their leader, voted in favour of the ban. So did Daisy Cooper, who speaks for them on health.
...At the same time, though, their party continues to campaign for the legalisation of cannabis. “The Liberal Democrats,” declares their website, “want to introduce a legal, regulated market for cannabis.” Yet senior party figures have effectively just voted to end a legal, regulated market for tobacco...
...It’s pure class snobbery... In the eyes of modern liberals, smoking tobacco is frightfully lower-class. It’s for Sun-reading, Brexit-voting, Red Wall-dwelling gammon. Smoking cannabis, by contrast, is fine, because it’s popular with nice middle-class Guardian readers who went to university...
...“Personal liberty is fine for people like us, not for people like you”...
READ FULL ARTICLE