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£20 for 30g American Spirit round here.
Pouch lasts me and my partner well over a week tho.
Reached a point where the smell of anything else makes me feel queasy. Ironic given it’s all shit.

Think the Venn diagram is a circle there too.

It wouldn't be a Venn diagram then, it'd be an Euler diagram.

By tax free outlet do you mean a bloke in the local?

Along those lines, but at least six local shops, mainly owned by Eastern Europeans.

Huh - I'm coming to Hastings next weekend, fancy DM'ing me some locations? As close to The Stag as possible please....

Be fake stuff though surely?

Where I live a legit packet of cigs is AU$30-$40. The illegal vape/ciggie shops that have popped up only charge $10-$12 for a packet of Marlboro Lights. Imported from Asia, ~$2 per pack retail in their nation of origin so the tobacco smugglers must be paying pennies for them and making a fortune.

Loose tobacco arrives in huge bales from China, it's packed and sealed into 30g pouches and costs $10. It's the only way a lot of people I know (musicians and people living with disabilities on benefits) can afford to smoke.

My mate always gets me to bring golden Virginia tobacco back from Spain, it is about half the price it is here. It is still £100 for 10 pouches but he is over the moon with that.

And they're 50gm pouches in Spain as well, right? I'm in Spain right now, gotta grab my sis a carton of B&H while I'm here. She tried GV to save money a little while back but she can't do it. 🤣

My mate uses it as a mixing tobacco......😉

There was an offies in Newtownards that used to have 50g packets of Golden Virginia for a fiver in a big onion sack under the counter. Word was it was lorry drivers coming back from the continent but in hindsight more than likely paramilitary fundraising of some description. It was fucking awful, half of it looked like chunks of bark.

That's what got me hooked in the first place. What they don't tell you is that it's the gateway to tobacco, the worst drug out of the lot! All the other fun drugs were kids stuff compared to baccy and the sauce.

Loose tobacco arrives in huge bales from China

Whatever they’re smoking, I can pretty much guarantee it’s not just tobacco. Not insinuating anything, I’m being quite literal: fake tobacco products are a huuuge market worldwide and particularly in China, with even legit distribution chains being tainted with fake product at every step of the way. There’s next to zero chance that bales of legit tobacco are shipped anywhere except a repackaging company with the capability to keep constant oversight of the supply chain.

Nope, they pay the tickets for old dears to take a coach trip to, say, Belgium in return for their baccy allowance.

It's all being smuggled into Australia by Iraqi gangsters, I have no doubt it's all absolute muck. The cigs look legit, from Vietnam and other SE Asian countries as well as loads of weird Chinese brands. All cheap as chips in their countries of origin, but you're right, they could all be fake as well.

100% and true for loads of teenagers who smoked spliffs when I was growing up.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2009/06/the-strange-underground-world-of-chinese-counterfeit-cigarettes.html

Counterfeit cigs are a big health hazard, but more so are fake cigarettes, which can contain pretty much anything.

Much like counterfeit bike parts from Asia, there are competitive businesses making quality products under someone else’s brand illegally, and there are fuckers bodging safety critical devices without reasonable care to prevent (unexpected) harm to the customer.

Fake stuff is everywhere:

https://fortune.com/2023/10/03/delta-fourth-major-us-airline-fake-jet-aircraft-engine-parts-forged-airworthiness-documents-uk-company-aog/

Happy next flight everyone!

Similar to a scare (to fliers, and those on the ground beneath them) some years ago where chips were being stolen from chip manufacturers, sometimes from the bin with a 'Defective - Do not Use' label on it, and (allegedly) finding their way into aircraft control/navigation systems.

I noticed quite a few tabacco fields in France which I haven't seen for a long time.

It got me wondering why more people don't grow their own? I mean if people indulge in ridiculous practices like growing tomatoes or looking after chickens, then surely growing and shaving your own backie must be trifling.

Mainly because it's against the law.

I challenge that parking spaces are a scarce resource. And I’m not trolling.

All space in a densely populated city is valuable and scarce. Parking spaces are far too numerous in london, they encourage people to own and use cars and take space away from people who need it more.

Cars would be left in the middle of the road due to lack of spaces or driveways. And they’re not. Some may be badly parked, but they’re parked at least.

Cars ARE left in the the road, and on pavements, in parks, in marked bays, leaving a narrow path in the middle for more cars to drive down, causing congestion, poor visibility and danger for other road users esp. children

I don’t think you can make an equivalence between not paying for parking and the more dangerous acts that drivers are prone to.

People's private motor vehicles being dumped everywhere, and the acres of dead space allocated for their storage, is one of the most pernicious aspects of car dominance, with both social and health impacts.

parking costs are overly expensive and that the revenue from it is spent badly.

If parking is too expensive why are there fucking parked cars everywhere

The smarter ones amongst us can grow them both on the same plant:

Apparently HS2 might not go to Euston after all

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67021225

If parking is too expensive why are there fucking parked cars everywhere

Because people suck it up.

How would you solve the other points in your post? Genuine question.