Clause 5 - Vehicles

Part of Health Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 10:35 am on 13 December 2005.

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Photo of Steve Webb Steve Webb Shadow Secretary of State for Health 10:35, 13 December 2005

I beg to move amendment No. 52, in clause 5, page 3, line 29, leave out ‘may’ and insert ‘shall’.

We wish to change just one word of the Bill. I have discovered that irony does not work in print, so I had better not say that the rest of the Bill is perfect because I do not wish to be misunderstood. We wish to change “may” to “shall”. In the context of smoking bans in vehicles, we suggest that, in clause 5(1), rather than stating that authorities may make regulations, we make it a duty on them to do so.

It may be that we misunderstand the meaning of “may”, but we want enclosed public places to be smoke-free, and many vehicles will be more enclosed than areas that are, for example, only 51 per cent. enclosed. Therefore, smoking in an enclosed carriage or vehicle is potentially far more injurious to the health of members of the public or employees who work in those environments. By inserting “shall” instead of “may”, we hope to rule out a situation in which the relevant national authority does not make regulations for vehicles to be smoke-free. In other words, the ban would not be complete if such regulations were not forthcoming. Essentially, we wish to place a duty on the relevant national authority, which includes this place in the case of England, to make regulations for vehicles to be smoke-free.

We want clarity on whether the Government were trying to allow for the possibility that relevant national authorities may not make regulations by using “may” rather than “shall”.