Clause 10 - Enforcement
Health Bill
6:00 pm
Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department of Health; Don Valley, Labour)
I will attempt to answer several points raised in the debate. On the number of enforcement staff that we estimate will be required in order to enforce the legislation, I refer hon. Members to page 53 of the explanatory notes:
“It is proposed that local enforcement officers dealing with smoke-free enclosed public places and workplaces. Based on consultation response we estimate this might be between 220 and 318 enforcement staff initially, tailing off as legislation becomes embedded.”
I hope that that indicates that we take seriously views expressed by different organisations, just as we have taken on board their independent comments on the different costs. We shall continue to discuss how the legislation will work in practice and how the funding should follow. Of course, monitoring raises issues. We must evaluate the Bill’s success in practice, and one way to do that may be the number of prosecutions. A high number will suggest non-compliance and raise the question whether we should do more to alert the public to the legal state of play. A low number would presumably be some indication of a high level of self-enforcement.
In the early stages we shall, like other countries, set up a national compliance line, by which organisations and individuals will give us information and intelligence about compliance with the law. We shall also engage in continuing discussions with organisations that represent the enforcement authorities, local authorities and the people who will carry out enforcement duties about how the measure works in practice. That is important and would be an essential part of the process, regardless of whether we imposed a total ban or allowed exemptions. Ireland has had to do the same thing as part and parcel of establishing how the law works.
It is wrong to suggest that the discussions under our proposals would not happen under a total ban, with no exemptions. We should still, in that case, have had to follow up matters of signage and enforcement, including appropriate fines for individuals or those who run establishments. We should, regardless, have needed conversations about which bodies should become enforcement authorities and the implications for their work load. It is wrong to suggest that those discussions result only from the approach in the Bill.