As of this week my boy (17) is no longer legally entitled to buy cigarettes. His half-brother (16) the same. It must be galling for a teenager finally to reach an age when he or she becomes legally entitled to join the adults in one of their glamorous vices, to enjoy that entitlement to the full for several months, and then to have it peremptorily withdrawn again by a sanctimonious Scotsman.

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