YOUR VIEWS

A few days ago I had a chat with the owner of a major chain of cinemas here in the Balearics regarding the above and in particular The King´s Speech. He told me that the distributors have only released eleven copies for the entire country, and obviously an english version wasn´t one of them.

He told me that due to the unexpected good reviews, they will most probably release more copies, one of them in the original version. When?. His guestimate is around March. Let´s hope he is right.

Yours sincerely, Simon Tow

DEAR SIR

REGARDING your article on Page 3 of Saturday's Daily Bulletin, can you tell me how it can be possible to know that the smoking ban has cost the service sector 30 to 50 per cent losses? The ban has been in place for barely two weeks. January is always a lean month for bars and restaurants as people have overspent over the Christmas and New Year period. And this 30 to 50 per cent loss is compared to what - Summer 2007??

I know many people, of all nationalities, who smoke and regularly frequent bars and restaurants. I don't know any who don't support the smoking ban. A lot of smokers wish they didn't smoke. They see this ban as an opportunity to help cut down or give up altogether. In the rest of Europe, smokers are happy to go outside for a cigarette. It's what they are now accustomed to and they have forgotten the time when smoking was permitted inside. As for non-smokers, they can finally go to many bars and restaurants which were too smoky and unhealthy for them before - with additional revenue for the bar owners.

It will be impossible to gauge the effect of this ban on bar and restaurant takings for at least a year, if not two. So therefore it seems pointless to devote column space to wild conjecture by the Restaurant Association and others who are against the ban.

Yours sincerely
S J Carter