MyShout

Don't hedge around the controversial issues raised by the smoking ban, says Stephen Oliver

As any journalist or exam student knows, one of the scary moments is when - faced with a blank sheet of paper and a deadline - no inspiration or idea springs to mind. Fingers hover as words resist the waiting paper. Writing this column is like that sometimes, but occasionally a theme emerges that dons a fluorescent jacket, sticks its hand in the air and shouts "Me!"

Last time I looked, becoming a lawyer required three years at university and one year at law school, followed by at least two years of articles or a training contract: all in all, six years. It takes a long time to learn the law.

What I had not appreciated is that modern legal- eagles also need a degree in botany. I wish I were making this up, but take it from me - it's true. The email winged its way to my in-box only yesterday, written by our licensing solicitor to our operations director:

"Dear Andrew, I have spoken to another solicitor about this. She draws a distinction between the ready- hedge which you are installing and the Portuguese laurel being installed by other companies. She considers the Portuguese laurel to be much less dense, and by no definition capable of forming a 'wall', whereas the ready-hedge is a dense structure which could be argued to be a wall.

"I have to say, having had a look at a sample of Portuguese laurel, I am struggling with her argument - it looks pretty dense to me. She is awaiting a written arboriculturist's report on the branch structure of this tree (and she is keen to emphasise it is a tree and not a hedge)..."

The inspiration for this bizarre correspondence on the subject of hedging is, of course, the smoking ban and whether providing outside shelter for customers with the help of a bit of greenery is within the law.

As we bought - literally - miles of the stuff to plant round our external drinking areas, the topic has become unusually interesting.

You have to wonder just what planet those environmental health officers (EHOs) inhabit who have so little else to do apart from examining the leaf structure of a bit of greenery which a licensee has put round a few tables outside the pub to shelter customers from wind and rain (and we've had more than enough of both of those lately).

What would Jonathan Swift, author of that great satirical work Gulliver's Travels, have made of all this? On his voyage to Brobdingnag, maybe a latter-day Gulliver would have stopped at an inn. Part of chapter nine might then have read:

"The garden was fenced with a hedge at least 120 feet high. I was endeavouring to find some gap in the hedge, when I discovered one of the EHOs in the next field. He appeared as tall as an ordinary spire steeple, and took about 10 yards at every stride. I was struck with the utmost fear and astonishment, and ran to hide myself. Whereupon seven monsters, like himself, came towards him with clip-boards in their hands."

Swift's words that "a tavern is a place where madness is sold by the bottle" are increasingly true.