Pub Landlord Nick Hogan – Jailed over No-smoking Ban.
There has been a fair amount of comment in the blogosphere regarding the six month jail sentence given to Nick Hogan for flouting the ‘no-smoking ban’.
Outrage has been duly expressed, here, there, and everywhere. Perhaps we can do better than just express outrage?
Nick was actually jailed for non-payment of the fine originally imposed for a ‘mass smoke-in’ on the day the ban came into force in 2007 in his pub, the ‘Swan and Barristers’ in Bolton. He no longer has that pub. He was fined again when council inspectors walked into his present pub and discovered a group of customers smoking – Nick wasn’t even on the premises.
His wife, Denise, is now managing their present pub in Chorley herself. Their trade is so low that they don’t even bother to open the downstairs bar. Nick is bankrupt, and had gone to court intending to argue that he could not afford the £500 a month payments demanded by the council towards their £10,000 bill for prosecuting him. He has already paid off £1,600. The court gave him a six month sentence instead, and he is currently in Forest Bank prison in Pendlebury, unable to help to earn the money which would ensure his release.
Denise has not even been able to speak to him since he was sentenced. She has merely been told to phone the prison on Monday to enquire when she might see him. She is confused, frightened, and feeling very lonely.
Denise has just said to me ‘all the people who disagree with the ban – where are they now? – and my Nick is in prison’. Quite.
If all the people who disagree with the no-smoking ban contributed a few coppers, then Nick would be released. If you can’t afford £1, then at least drop Nick a line and let him know he is not forgotten – not surprisingly, he is feeling very depressed.
Denise has no idea how to use the Internet, she has no idea how many of us are against the no-smoking ban. Let’s show her.
£1 each – just 10,000 of you – let’s see if the blogosphere can do more than merely rant in unison. Once the amount received totals the outstanding fine, they have to release Nick.
Nick’s address is:
HMP & YOI Forest Bank
Agecroft Road
Pendlebury
Manchester
M27 8FB
Update: Old Holborn has now kindly set up a Paypal donate function. Go HERE – right at the top of the right hand sidebar and you can contribute to Nick’s costs.
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March 4, 2010 at 17:18 -
What a travesty.
This Canadian non-smoker has just sent 10 pounds via Old Holborn. -
March 3, 2010 at 02:27 -
Freedom to Choose have set up a system for people to send cheques to their Treasurer’s department.
I suggest mark cheques ‘Re Nick Hogan’ on the back, but make them payable to Freedom to Choose.
Send to:
Freedom to Choose (Scotland)
C/o The Dalmeny Bar
297 Leith Walk
Edinburgh
EH6 8SAIf you have any worries, it is hard to see how anyone other than Freedom to Choose could possibly cash your cheque!
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March 2, 2010 at 19:54 -
” Anna Raccoon – You have no idea how many people who have donated have then said …
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March 2, 2010 at 20:30
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March 2, 2010 at 18:59 -
Ain’t the web amazing? It’s hard to imagine a similar campaign pre-internet, without the quick responses and rapid spread of support. Now, just imagine what might be achieved during the coming election…
I’m so impressed with the unfairness meted out to Nick that I’ve donated and I don’t smoke!-
March 2, 2010 at 19:41
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March 2, 2010 at 18:30 -
Will contact some of them soon – once I’ve had my tea !
Have had great responses from our American friends in the past.
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March 2, 2010 at 17:46 -
Donation just made. Total is now heading well over 5k. Has anybody messaged the US Libertarian websites / blogs ?
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March 2, 2010 at 17:54
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March 2, 2010 at 14:09 -
Thanks Anna. Cheque in the post today.
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March 2, 2010 at 12:53 -
I tried to use the paypal thingy but having filled it in it wouldn’t work. Could you publish Nicks details ie how to send a cheque and Ill gladly donate.
With Best wishes.
jrb
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March 2, 2010 at 13:11
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March 1, 2010 at 19:55 -
On second thoughts,
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March 1, 2010 at 19:21 -
March 1, 2010 at 17:35 -
l understand your point Junican but lets give him the ‘fighting fund’ and he can decide himself what to do which l think is really what it’s all about … the right to choose.
Personally l hope the fund reaches it’s target very quickly and he comes out. He’ll be wanted by most of the MSM on this and he’ll get a great deal of exposure to put forward his views and beliefs.
Donated.
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March 1, 2010 at 08:34 -
Junican, I respect and understand your opening statement, but think Nick has ‘done his bit’ for now and should be freed asap.
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March 1, 2010 at 03:43 -
At the moment, Nick is a hero. If people pay the fine for him, then they render his heroic efforts useless and pointless.
I live in Bolton. Within a few days after the ban came into force, July 07, I went into The Swan (Nick’s pub). Nick had posters over the bar which said, words to the effect, “It is against the law to smoke here. If you do, then it is at your own risk”. This was not good enough for the powers that be. They required him to, somehow, FORCE, his customers not to smoke. But, needless to say, they did not tell him precisely HOW he was supposed to force his customers not to smoke. Somehow, he had to do it, without, of course, actually using physical force.With great courage (and despite the fact that there were those people who were saying that he only did it to swell his coffers), he persevered. As I understand it, he persevered for as long as he could, despite being attacked on all sides by landlords, the local authority, the police and everyone else who could attack him. In the end, he was battered into submission.
What really, really surprises me is that the pubcos and the tobacco companies did not rally round and back him up; that they did not finance him to take this question of, “To what extent should he risk his own life in order to force people not to smoke in his premises” to the highest court in the land. Was that because the pubcos believed that their premises would be flooded with non-smokers? Did the Tobacco companies believe that Britain does not matter because they have the rest of the world to go at? Shock horror! Non-smokers are not flooding into pubs and the rest of the world is introducing smoking bans. Perhaps these organisations will start to think and start to take steps. – in fact, there are already signs that the tobacco companies are getting worried (vis, plain packaging).
Now that I have the address to write to, I am going to write to Nick directly tomorrow to express my support for his courageous actions. I have already expressed my abhorrence of his sentence to the prospective conservative candidate for my Bolton constituency in writing.
Let us support him in every way we can, but do not relieve the powers- that-be of their responsibility for sending him to prison in the first place!
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February 28, 2010 at 23:14 -
I’ve just donated a fiver, great to see the blogosphere flexing a bit of collective muscle, well done to Anna too.
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February 28, 2010 at 21:01 -
Have used the Paypal link @ Old Holborn’s site, and will pass it to others.
Full marks to OH for setting it up, and to you, Anna, for publicising it. -
February 28, 2010 at 19:51 -
Anna – excellent, thanks. Put me down for
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February 28, 2010 at 19:16 -
You really need Nick’s prison number for sending cheques directly to him – wouldn’t want them to be “lost” in the prison mail system. Anna, can you act as a collection point as I don’t deal with PayPal?
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February 28, 2010 at 19:18
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February 28, 2010 at 17:52 -
ive sent him a tenner, and im anti smoking
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February 28, 2010 at 19:15
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February 28, 2010 at 17:31 -
Donation done. Hope the amount can be raised.
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February 28, 2010 at 17:46
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February 28, 2010 at 17:13 -
Excellent idea.
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February 28, 2010 at 17:07 -
I’ve added a donate function at my place
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February 28, 2010 at 17:06 -
February 28, 2010 at 17:01 -
Anna – I am trying to get bodies to take part in aprotest sit-in out side of Nick’s jail so that we who are against the smoking ban can serve our “time” with him. I will certainly write to him – tell me where do I send money and
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February 28, 2010 at 17:19
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February 28, 2010 at 16:36
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