SMOKING – YOUR CHOICE (Not just another anti-smoking lecture) Roger Harding Formerly a professional soldier and an enthusiastic explorer, Roger Harding is now a successful Financial Adviser, Mortgage Broker and part-time public speaker. An interesting man by any standards, Roger’s presentation style is completely different from conventional ‘lecturing’. It is designed to be more involving through being more interactive and spontaneous. It is certainly challenging. As a former smoker who has successfully broken the habit, Roger is now a man with a mission! Ideally, he would prefer the audience NOT to know the subject of his talk in advance. Roger uses surprise as a deliberate technique for audience engagement. He has a charismatic commitment to revealing the true facts about tobacco usage and nicotine addiction. “I like to get members of the audience to participate in a live debate. Together we examine all the facts, all the evidence from reliable sources. For example, that Nicotine is every bit as addictive as many Class A drugs and that if cigarettes were invented today, they would almost certainly be banned. I invite the audience to consider the issue rationally, perhaps for the first time ever. Paradoxically I also encourage emotions to run high.  I want people to stand up and be counted. Whatever happens, I want them to remember the experience – to be intellectually stimulated, to be moved by the arguments. If two or three will commit not to start smoking – or to stop smoking now that they’ve started, I know that my message has really got through.” Roger Harding’s presentations are provocative but popular. They put the issue in sharp focus. Then at least those who choose to ignore the facts, are making a democratic decision, an informed choice and it is their choice! SMOKING – YOUR CHOICE (Not just another anti-smoking lecture) Anthony McLellan An alarmingly high proportion of young people today try smoking cigarettes at some point.  Peer pressure, curiosity, or rebellion may often be the motives.  This presentation is designed not to simply preach at the audience about the “evil weed” but instead to encourage them to make objective and accurately informed decisions around this subject. Not just another smoking lecture, because this one perhaps appears more open-minded than most.  It does not support, encourage or speak well of smoking, but neither does it condemn or criticise those people who do choose to smoke.  This approach has been chosen following years of addressing young people and combines a factual content with an awareness that forbidden fruits are usually the most tempting and often-tasted.  This presentation delivers statistical evidence of the dangers of cigarette smoking, looks at the addictive allure of nicotine, and addresses 2 burning questions – “Why do people take up smoking?” “Why do people continue to smoke?” By taking a look at both short and long term justifications, costs and consequences, the audience will find themselves involved in unveiling “the whole picture” of a product that kills 312 Britons every 24 hours. Self-respect does not go without a mention in this presentation.  Self-respect and exercising its power.  Your students will be given plenty of food for thought as they are left to digest the information and decide for themselves the quality of life they deserve.  They will hear a liberating message.