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Total smoking ban inevitable – Hewitt
Health secretary Patricia Hewitt has admitted it will only be a matter of time before a complete smoking ban will introduced in England.
Speaking on the BBC Sunday AM programme on 27 December, Hewitt said a total ban was inevitable and simpler to implement.
On the show, Hewitt responded to the suggestion that the partial ban could create social division as many pubs which do not serve food are located in poorer areas in the country and therefore would still leave many people vulnerable to second-hand smoke.
“I think that’s an absolutely fair point,” she said. “A total ban would be a simpler thing to do and I think it is only a matter of time before we get to a total ban.”
“However, most of the other countries which have implemented a ban on smoking – including Australia, parts of the US, Norway and many other European countries – have done so using a two-tier approach which has included exemptions for the hospitality industry in the initial phase,” she said.
The minister denied the government had got the legislation wrong and refused to predict the exact time-line for a complete ban.
Hewitt’s comments came just days after DCMS minister Richard Caborn admitted at the Business in Sport and Leisure’s (BISL) annual conference that the government may have done better during the run-up to announcing its proposals for a smoking ban.
“What is important for all of us to remember is that nothing has yet been set in tablets of stone,” he said. “There is still a long way to go until the law comes into force in 2007.”