---

Smoke-free (Penalties and Discounted Amounts) Regulations 2007

I did not realise that St John’s, Smith Square, had been deconsecrated; that explains a lot. I am horrified to hear about what happened in her cathedral. Twenty-five years ago, my wife and I were horrified to see a party of German peasants—““peasants”” is the only word that one can use—wearing those short-peaked caps that one finds in Nordic countries and smoking small cigars as they went into St Mark’s. They got a long way in before they were stopped. I have never come across that in England; I am horrified that we are not as well behaved in this country as I had thought we were. It must be pretty unusual all the same. However, it would be nice to hear from the noble Baroness whether it would be necessary to pollute our parish churches and cathedrals with ““no smoking”” signs all over the place. They are not venues where you would expect people to smoke. Like the noble Earl, Lord Howe, I am alarmed at the very high maximum penalty for failing to prevent smoking in a smoke-free place; that is, £2,500. As he says, that is much higher than applies in Scotland. What will happen if the landlord of a pub or the manager of a restaurant tries to evict someone who is smoking? Will he not be arrested by the police for assault? We constantly read of people trying to make citizen’s arrests in a very public-spirited fashion being arrested by the police and kept in a stinking cell for several hours because they have allegedly taken the law into their own hands. Is there not a danger that that will happen here? Why is there no fixed penalty lower rate available for this offence as there is for the others? On the exemptions and vehicles regulations, Iam delighted that provision is made for offshore installations to have designated rooms which are well insulated so that smoke cannot drift into other parts. But why are not workers on the mainland given rooms which are well sealed so that smoke does not pollute other parts of the factory, office block or whatever? Why are only offshore installations being given this privilege? Obviously, it cannot be dangerous, because the Government would not allow that. It seems to me to be mean spirited. I see that vehicles partly enclosed by a roof are caught by the regulations, which will presumably knock out a Citroën ““Deux Chevaux””, if such an example still exists. But a vehicle where the hood folds down totally into the body is exempt. There are not many cars used for business in that category now, but I suspect that there may be once these regulations come into play. Again, on a point of detail, under Regulation 11(5)(b) of Part 3, a vehicle is exempt where someone, "““has a right to use it which is not restricted to a particular journey””." I have been trying to puzzle that out: I am probably very dense, but I am not quite sure of the subtlety there. Finally, on the sale of tobacco to young persons, there is not really very much that I can say except to repeat that it is paradoxical that a Government, which six-and-a-quarter years ago used the Parliament Act to force through a law to allow boys and girls of 16 and 17 years-old to be subjected to dangerous sexual practices—which the noble Lord, McColl of Dulwich, a great medical expert, told us was twice as dangerous as smoking in moderation—are restricting tobacco for people of the same age group, although it is not being banned totally. I do not suppose that I will get very far on that, but I would be interested in answers to my earlier queries.