The truth is out there

After last week's smoking ban announcement, people are looking for answers.

For now, the national focus on the smoking ban has moved on. Bird flu, George Best and other issues quickly took over from smoking in the eyes of the public, following the government's announcement of the proposed ban on smoking in public places, including pubs serving food, last month.

Wales - given the powers to set its own ban in the Health Bill - Northern Ireland and Scotland are now advancing rapidly down the road of a blanket ban.

But thousands of pubs in England, such as the Dragoon in Brampton (see below), can't move on as they fret over their futures and face up to the likelihood that they are going to have to make a very difficult decision.

After thousands of pieces of evidence were submitted to the Department of Health's summer consultation, including The Publican's own submission on behalf of hundreds of our readers, licensees want to know why the government plumped for the option that nobody wanted.

The regulatory impact assessment - a document which examines the likely impact of policy and the range of options for implementing it - which accompanied the Bill published on October 27 makes it clear that the government was aware of the widespread opposition in the pub industry to a ban on smoking in pubs serving food.

The document says: "For the pub trade the strongest objections have been to option 4 [the ban in pubs serving food] as this was felt to present an unfair choice between smoking and providing food: with the choice of one or the other likely to result in increased costs to the business or loss of revenue."

The headline announcement has been made, but there are still far too many questions to be answered. And there are too few to be had in the Health Bill itself (see below), which, on this issue at least, seems to have more holes in it than a jacket pocket with a lit cigarette in it.

As the Bill makes its way through Parliament, The Publican will be doing all it can to get the answers to these questions in the months to come.

What we know...​

• The government is proposing to ban smoking in all pubs serving food
• Smoking "in the bar area" will be banned everywhere
• Further consultation will be carried out on the possibility of smoking rooms being required in pubs allowing smoking
• Membership clubs will be exempt
• The probable start-date is summer 2007
• There will be a review of the ban three years after it comes in - with some in the trade already interpreting this as a complete ban from 2010
• Licensees will be fined up to £200 if they knowingly permit smoking on their premises
• Pubs which do not display the correct no-smoking signage could also be fined £200
• Licensees who are found to persistently allow smoking on their premises could lose their licence
• Smokers will be issued with a fixed penalty notice of £50 for lighting up in a pub serving food or another public place
• Local authorities will be charged with enforcing the ban.

...and what we don't​

• How will food be defined?
• Will customers be able to bring in their own hot or cold food from outside the premises?
• How, exactly, will the ban be enforced?
• How will the bar area be defined?
• Will licensees be given planning permission to install covered canopies outside the pub?
• When will wet-led pubs know if they are going to be required to set aside separate smoking rooms?
• Will pubs be able to turn themselves into private members' clubs in order to continue to allow smoking on the premises?
• Could smoking pubs offer food as part of a paid-for event, such as a Christmas party?
• Why did the government plough ahead with this option, despite the acknowledged huge opposition to it?

Next week:​ the Department of Health answers your questions about how the smoking ban will apply to you.

The voice of the pub trade​

The Publican led the charge against the government's smoking proposals last week, appearing in the national press, television and international media to help put licensees' views across.

The Times carried a front page story focussing on the fact that a fifth of pubs responding to The Publican's Food Report have said they will drop food in favour of smoking if a ban comes in.

The Publican survey was also picked up by television channels BBC News 24 and ITV as well as radio stations including LBC, and was also reported across the world in Europe, the US and Australia, where restrictions on smoking in pubs have already been introduced in some areas.

The Publican's editor Caroline Nodder said: "It is important that licensees' opinions are heard. The team at The Publican has been working hard to get the message out there that the current proposals will hit small community pubs hard, lead to unfair competition between pubs and working men's clubs and spawn a new breed of male-dominated wet-let boozers."

And guess where else will be exempt from the ban?​

A House of Commons loophole will allow MPs who enforced a nationwide smoking ban in pubs and workplaces from 2007 to continue to smoke in Westminster.

MPs are already under fire for ruling that private members' clubs - such as their own bars in Westminster, would be exempt from a smoking ban. Now it is revealed that, while many licensees will have to force their customers to go outside for a smoke, ministers will still be allowed to puff away at their desks.

Under ancient laws, the Palace of Westminster is technically exempt from health and safety laws.

Robert Humphreys, honorary secretary of the All-Party Parliamentary Beer Group, said there was a wide range of views on smoking across Westminister. But he added: "The Beer Group supports pubs but is against smoking. Whatever is decided should be applied to everyone, equally and fairly."

What the Bill says​

Among the few details to emerge from the Bill so far are:

• "Smoking" refers to smoking tobacco or any other substance
• Smoking includes being in possession of lit tobacco or any other substance which could be smoked
• Any premises used as a place of work by more than one person (even if they work at different times) must be smoke-free at all times - even when it is closed to the public
• In pubs which allow smoking, the person in charge of the premises may be required to clearly designate rooms where smoking is permitted
• It is the duty of any person who manages a smoke-free premises to make sure that compliant no-smoking signs are displayed - anyone failing to do this will be committing an offence
• Anyone charged with permitting smoking on their premises can defend themselves if they prove that they took reasonable steps to cause the person in question to stop smoking, or if they prove that they did not know and could not possibly have been expected to know that the person was smoking, or that on any other grounds it was not reasonable for them to comply with the duty
• An authorised officer of an enforcement authority can issue smokers who have committed an offence with a fixed penalty notice.

To read the Bill in full, visit: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/​cmbills/069/2006069.htm​

Case study​

Exemptions from the smoking ban for clubs and wet-led pubs will have left many licensees - including John Franklin in Cambridgeshire - with a desperately difficult decision to make.​

John Franklin of the Dragoon in Cambridgeshire is one of thousa