[Mr. Eric Illsley in the Chair]
Health Bill
11:45 am
Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department of Health; Don Valley, Labour)
I will deal with the last point first. The Bill on Second Reading represented the collective decision of the Cabinet—the collective will of the Cabinet, including the Secretary of State for Transport. Therefore, this is the Bill that we are all supporting, even though some people may have had different views before reaching this point. There has been consultation between officials in each Department on the Government amendments and about how the measures affect different Departments, what legislation is already on the statute books, and so on. I hope that I can reassure the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) and other members of the Committee that I would not have tabled them unless I felt that they had the Secretary of State’s support and that the Secretary of State supported the measures in the Bill on smoke-free areas.
The hon. Member for Westbury mentioned timing. It is our assumption that the Secretary of State for Transport will mirror regulations and timing will be consistent with the Department of Health regulations. We hope that at the same time as regulations on substantially enclosed public places are brought forth, similar regulations will be brought forth on vehicles of one form or another. We will be working to ensure that these all come together.
On oil rigs, as we said in earlier discussions, just like Ireland and Scotland in their deliberations, we have had to weigh up the issues that arise where a place is both a person’s residence from which he cannot easily escape and his workplace. Clearly there are overriding health and safety issues involved in stepping outside the enclosed space on to an oil rig or the deck of a ship. That is why we are working to create smoke-free environments indoors on these installations, recognising that for obvious reasons people cannot simply step outdoors.
We are in discussion with the Ministry of Defence about some of the detailed policy issues that are peculiar to the forces. We are looking at how the policy and exemptions would work in a military context. Indeed, the Ministry of Defence recognises the need to replicate in a service context the aim of the policy as it applies to a civilian situation. The discussions are ongoing. The MOD is also considering its own policies on the health of its work force, and I must say that it has been very engaged in some of our discussions and very helpful. In fact, many services have already considered some of the issues that we are addressing under this legislation, which is to be welcomed.