Health Bill

Adhering to my principle that I established at the beginning, I will deal with the issue of combined workplaces and residential properties when we come to that particular amendment at a later stage. As it stands, the Bill provides for workplaces to be smoke-free at all times if the workplace is used by more than one person, whether or not the persons are working there at the same time. This measure is to protect employees from second-hand smoke exposure, regardless of the time that they work within a set of premises. Amendment No. 6, moved by the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, would amend Clause 2 so that workplaces would be smoke-free only when more than one person is present in the workplace at the same time. That would mean that it would be lawful for a security guard who sits in a small enclosed cabin to smoke up until the end of his shift, only for his replacement to have to sit in the same cabin and be exposed to his colleague’s second-hand smoke. We know that tobacco smoke contains more than 4,000 chemicals in the form of particles and gases. Some of these have marked irritant properties and some 50 are known or suspected human carcinogens, including heavy metals, radionuclides and substances known as reproductive toxins. The Environmental Protection Agency in the United States has classified environmental tobacco smoke as class A—in other words, a known human carcinogen along with asbestos, arsenic, benzene and radon gas. The World Health Organisation has also classified tobacco smoke as a known human carcinogen. Importantly, some 85 per cent of second-hand smoke consists of invisible, odourless gases. I understand that research shows that second-hand smoke can linger for extended periods of time, even when visible second-hand smoke has cleared. I believe it is right to give workers who work alone in a set of premises which is used by different people at different times the same protection from second-hand smoke as we are giving to all other workers, and I hope that noble Lords will not press this amendment.