So Australia are banning branded packaging on cigarettes, why not go one further and ban all of our vices?

Chocolate wrappers without colour and alcohol with no names.

Where does the sanitisation of life (that some governments are hell-bent on) end following Australia's decision to introduce plain packaging for cigarettes?

We all know that smoking is bad for our health. We're also aware that they're not much good for those around us. But does that make pillorying the smokers and tobacco companies acceptable?

There are many other products openly available on the market which are equally as bad or perhaps worse. The food high in calories that has made the western world a blubby embarrassment, alcohol that has made many city centres no-go areas on a Friday and Saturday night and is ruining the livers of the young. Or perhaps the carbon emitting cars that have implications on our breathing and worst of all devastating and irreversible affects on our environment.

The introduction of plain packaging for cigarettes feels like it is just the start. Once the smokers and tobacco companies have been beaten to their last smokey breath - there will be more vices on the target list of these goody-two-shoes governments. That purple chocolate wrapper is too appealing to children - make it white. That alcohol sounds exotic - call it bland spirit. That car looks exciting - take the engine out.

We're on the path to blandness in a world in which no-one can make a choice without someone telling them what not to do and what they should be doing. In the utopian world these meddling governments envisage, everyone will be free of vice. But those same vices can be among the joys of life - so leave us alone to enjoy them if we wish.