Business and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2020-07-13
Topic: Health
Stephen Greenhalgh (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, and supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham and the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner of Worcester, seeks to ensure that pavement licences may only be granted by local authorities subject to the condition that smoking is prohibited. The Government recognise the vital importance of health and safety concerns but we do not believe that imposing a condition to prohibit outdoor smoking would be proportionate. I shall explain why We are helping our pubs, cafes and restaurants to safely reopen, and we are securing jobs by making it quicker, easier and cheaper to operate outside. The Government’s priority is protecting public health against the transmission of the coronavirus while ensuring that venues can remain open and economically sustainable. The Government have no plan to ban outdoor smoking. Excessive regulation would lead to pub closures and job losses. Smokers should exercise social responsibility and be considerate, and premises are able to set their own rules to reflect customer wishes The Bill allows local authorities to set their own conditions on licences and makes it clear that those authorities will want to consider public health and public safety in doing so. Therefore, local authorities can exercise their condition-making powers to impose no-smoking conditions. Where there is a breach of the condition, the local authority can serve a notice to remedy the breach and even remove the licence, so local authorities have the power to revoke licences where they give rise to genuine health and safety concerns Businesses can make their own non-smoking policies for outside space, which can include restrictions on smoking near food. There is a need for social responsibility, as I have already said, and smokers should be considerate to others. The amendment would have unintended consequences, pushing drinkers on to pavements and roads away from licensed trading areas. It would also cause confusion with existing outdoor areas that would still permit smoking I have to say that it is great to see the reformation of the dream team of my noble friend Lord Lansley and the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, given what they have achieved in public health terms—the display ban, the ban on vending machines—and to hear of the work between my noble friends Lord Lansley and Lord Young in cooking up a free vote on banning smoking in public places. However, I reiterate that this is a temporary emergency form of legislation and it should not be a backdoor route to try to ban smoking in public places, as pointed out by my noble friends Lady Neville-Rolfe, Lady Noakes and Lord Naseby As the son of a surgeon, I appreciate the contribution of my noble friend Lord Ribeiro and the points made by the noble Lords, Lord German and Lord Carlile of Berriew, and my noble friends Lord Shrewsbury and Lord Sheikh. The case is now incontrovertible that there are dangers from second-hand and passive smoking. I can say that as the son of a vascular surgeon who has published extensively on the impact of smoking on arterial disease. The Government are committed, as has already been stated, to achieving a smoke-free England by 2030. We are already taking steps to get there, as was referenced by the noble Lord, Lord Rennard. England’s smoking levels continue to fall and are currently at 13.9%, the lowest rate on record. We will publish the prevention Green Paper consultation response in due course and set out our plans at a later date to achieve a smoke-free England. So we support the implementation and evaluation of smoke-free policies in line with the evidence as it emerges The noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, made the important point that any changes of this nature should be made in consultation with the hospitality industry, so amending this Bill is not the way to implement such changes. I note her points about specific places and I will write to her on those matters. For the reasons that I have set out I am not able to accept the amendment, and I hope the noble Baroness will therefore withdraw it.