Health Bill

If we had had the pleasure of the noble Lord’s company a little earlier, he would have heard me say, in response to the noble Earl, Lord Howe, on the subject of enforcement costs in the regulatory impact assessment, that we are in negotiations with local authority interests on this matter. He has been around in government and knows that these things usually take a little time, but they are in hand. Before I respond to Amendment No. 45, it may be helpful to the Committee if I go back to our previous exchange about the Health and Safety Executive. It may explain why the noble Earl, Lord Howe, was understandably a little confused about its position and it may clarify matters for the Committee. The noble Earl read accurately in paragraph 58 of the Explanatory Notes that there is a possibility of the Health and Safety Executive being an enforcement authority. That is true, so he is not imagining things or hallucinating. However, since the Explanatory Notes were published, we have had further discussions with the Health and Safety Executive, and it does not wish to take on enforcement authority responsibility. Therefore, the regulations will specify local authorities only as the enforcement authorities under this legislation. That does not mean that the Health and Safety Executive will be uncooperative in this area. It will adopt in England and Wales a policy similar to that which it has in Scotland: its inspectors will assist local authorities by drawing any obvious breaches of the legislation to the attention of employers. As they go about their normal business and obtain information in this area, they will draw it to the attention of the local authority enforcement authorities. I hope that that clarifies the matter for the Committee, in particular for the noble Earl, Lord Howe. I enjoy the way in which, almost like Harold Pinter, the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, writes his own script and mine as well. The noble Lord could almost save me doing the job. I do not want to disappoint him in any way by suggesting that we agree with Amendment No. 45. I know how bitterly disappointed he would be if we did. I repeat what I said earlier: it is the Government’s intention for local authorities to have the responsibility for enforcing smoke-free legislation. But, as I also said, the enforcement officers could be different persons in the local authority. In the main we expect them to be local authority environmental health officers, but it could be others such as trading standards officers, who have some responsibilities for health and safety. It will be up to the local authority to identify and appoint the most appropriate staff to act as enforcement officers for the purpose of this legislation. As I said earlier, there will be full training for the people who have these duties. The provisions relating to enforcement have been left to delegated legislation to enable flexibility to amend arrangements if need be without the need to amend primary legislation. I come back to the point that over time local authorities may be reorganised and people’s responsibilities change. We believe that it is right to make the primary legislation as flexible as possible. Given the amount of detail that is likely to be covered in relation to enforcement, we believe that the issue is best left to delegated legislation. When he had up a full head of steam, the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, described graphically what might happen in a pub if there were an exchange of views about the appropriateness or otherwise of an individual having a cigarette. Any manager of a pub has the power to remove a member of the public who is committing an offence. It is open to the publican to remove people from his premises for a variety of reasons. In practice, the experience of Scotland and Ireland is that smokers obey the law. I am not sure why the noble Lord believes that people in England will be any less law-abiding than has been the experience in other countries which have passed smoke-free legislation. I can see that he is very concerned about the matter but we do not believe that it is necessary to go any further than we have in the Bill as drafted, and leave the issue of the enforcement authorities for delegated legislation.