Planning chaos looms over smoking shelters

Smoking in public places will become illegal this summer. Anyone who lights up in a smoke-free place will be liable for a £50 fixed penalty fine.

29 January 2007 08:55

A surge of applications from pubs and businesses wanting to open smoking shelters is expected in the next few months before the smoking ban is introduced this summer.

And one council fears the ban could lead to an increase in anti-social behaviour because people will be congregating outside to smoke. The new law comes into operation in July and will mean most public places will have to become smoke-free.

Many pubs were expected to apply to put up smoking shelters where drinkers could have a cigarette, but so far councils have had just a handful of applications for smoking shelters.

They fear that could turn into a flood in the next few months when councils launch a publicity campaign highlighting what firms have to do. At South Norfolk Council a working group has been in place since December 2006 and has identified a number of issues which will need to be tackled.

One is the potential for more anti-social behaviour involving smokers in residential areas and town centres where people leave pubs and other premises to smoke.

Officers also warn that could lead to an increase in the amount of litter on the streets, with people dropping their cigarette butts on pavements across the county. In some parts of the country, pubs have put in applications for smoking shelters only to have them rejected because they were too big, prompting some councils to issue guidelines. A spokeswoman for Norwich City Council said so far the authority had received three or four applications, but would draft in extra resources if the trickle turned into a flood.

She said: “Whenever someone puts in a planning application we give them guidelines before they submit the application, so we do talk to them first. In the next few months we will be looking at how all councils will tackle this because we need to have a united front on it. But we do have some extra resources to manage it and I think lessons were learnt from the licensing changes.”

The licensing changes saw councils struggle to cope in the first year that landlords had to apply to local authorities, rather than magistrates, for licences to serve alcohol. When the ban comes in, anyone who smokes in a smoke-free place will be liable to a £50 fixed penalty fine, while businesses which fail to prevent smoking in a smoke-free place can be fined up to £2,500 if convicted.

A blanket ban on smoking at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital was introduced two years ago - and health bosses revealed how at least one person was being admitted to the hospital with lung cancer every day.

But another reason for the lack of applications is also because landlords feel they need more guidance on the sort of applications which they should put in - with many still unclear over what would be defined as an enclosed space.

Just before Christmas, the Department of Health laid guidelines before Parliament. They confirm an outside area must either have no roof, or have a roof but be less than 50pc walled. The guidelines also indicate that both fixed and moveable structures, including canvas awnings, are classed as roofs.

Are you a pub landlord planning to build a smoking shelter? Call Dan Grimmer on 01603 772375 or e-mail dan.grimmer@archant.co.uk

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