What the Sunday papers said
Dr James Le Fanu writes in the Sunday Telegraph that the smoking ban "threatens to kill off that traditional centre of community life, the pub". A pub owner from East Sussex writes to the doctor saying "There is no longer any chit-chat and happy hubbub around the bar. They've gone outside, those who can be bothered to come at all. The non-smokers are out with the smokers and there is no banter with the staff any more." Average pub takings are down by a quarter, says Le Fanu, and a Herefordshire reader reports that five pubs within a 10-mile radius of his home are set to close. This, Le Fanu adds, shows the road, if not necessarily to hell, at least to empty pubs and rejected (if "healthy") school meals is, as ever, paved with the good intentions of those who presume to know what is best for us but are too dim to see, more than one step ahead, the consequences of their actions. - Sunday Telegraph
Smirting - the smoking ban-induced habit of punters who nip outside a pub for a cigarette and who then cop off with a fellow smoker - is proving such a success that even non-smokers are trying to get in on the act. Simon Proctor, a smirter and the co-founder of Speed Dater, has created non-smoking smirting areas at his evenings to make sure the clean breathers don't miss out - he even hands out candy cigarettes as icebreakers. "Smirting is 100 per cent real," says Simon. "The other day, I was waiting for my event to start. I went out for a fag on my own, and there was a woman doing the same. She was attractive; we got talking. It was perfect, really." - Sunday Times
Sainsbury's chairman Sir Philip Hampton is closing in on a deal with Delta Two as talks resume this week about a sale to the fund backed by Qatar's royal family-dominated government. The two sides have been locked in negotiations since last month, when Delta Two first contacted the supermarket group with its indicative 600p approach. Hampton will also be under pressure from Robert Tchenguiz, whose R20 investment vehicle owns 10 per cent of Sainsbury's and favours a Qatari bid. Tchenguiz is keen to split the company in two: into a real estate investment trust (REIT), and a retail operating company. However, this plan looks to have been floored following the abandonment of his £4.5bn property joint venture with pub company Mitchells & Butlers. - Scotland On Sunday
As the Great British Beer Festival drew to a close, the Sunday People's Rachel Bletchly looked at some interesting facts about beer…the fame of Burton ales gave rise to the phrase "gone for a Burton" meaning to die; it was a World War II euphemism suggesting a missing comrade had merely nipped out for a beer. In old England, town inns paid a government tax known as a "scot" for serving beer and beer lovers who left town to drink at rural pubs were said to be drinking "scot free." The first ale house punters in England used clay tankards with whistles baked into the rim or handle. When they needed a refill, they used the whistle to get some service - hence "Wet your whistle." Lastly, in ancient Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq), tavern owners found guilty of overcharging patrons for beer were put to death by drowning. - Sunday People
