Clause 5 - Vehicles
Health Bill
11:00 am
Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire, Conservative)
Just for clarity, is the Minister saying that a commercial vehicle owned by a business or an organisation, whether or not it passes from employee to employee, would be a smoke-free environment? I am thinking of employees who smoke and drive a lorry, van or other vehicle all day. One person whom I know smokes and drives a lorry all day. Under this provision, he will no longer be allowed to smoke in that vehicle. He is in it for eight hours a day and, while he is there, the environment in the vehicle is his, not his organisation’s. Is the Minister now saying that second-hand smoke has a residual effect that causes harm? Is she saying that if somebody has smoked in a vehicle and somebody else gets into it at some stage, there will be residual effects from the driver’s smoking? That would take us into a new category.