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Think the banning of smoking is over? Think again!
They are addicted to telling you how to live it seems....
| quote: | Dark days ahead for lighting up
Bar, restaurant owners angry, call for compensation ignored. Ontario passes tough anti-smoking bill but activists vow to fight for total ban
Toronto Star- June 9, 2005 by Rob Ferguson
Anti-tobacco activists vowed yesterday to keep pressing for stricter restrictions on smoking after the Ontario Legislature passed one of North America's toughest laws against lighting up.
While their ultimate goal remains a total ban on tobacco products, a push continues to curb a habit that kills 16,000 people a year in Ontario - the biggest preventable cause of death - and costs the health-care system $1.7 billion annually.
The wish list includes higher cigarette taxes, bans on smoking on outdoor patios, at building entrances and in cars with children, reducing the number of stores selling cigarettes and protection for tenants in buildings with common ventilation systems.
"There is a lot to do," said Michael Perley, director of the Ontario Campaign for Action on Tobacco, noting Ontario is behind its target of raising tobacco taxes to the national average.
Activists envy the results in California where both smoking and cancer rates have dropped after years of such measures.
For now, Health Minister George Smitherman said he'll concentrate on implementing the Smoke-Free Ontario Act approved yesterday in a 71-6 vote. The six dissenters were Progressive Conservatives, several from ridings in tobacco country.
The law, replacing a patchwork of municipal non-smoking bylaws and banning smoking in all indoor work and public places, comes into effect next May 31.
On that date, the 2 million or 20 per cent of Ontarians who smoke will find designated smoking rooms in bars and restaurants outlawed - leaving homes, cars and the great outdoors among the few places to puff. Smoking will be permitted on outdoor patios, providing they're not somehow enclosed.
The rare exceptions include separately ventilated smoking rooms in nursing homes and psychiatric hospitals, where patients must be able to smoke without the help of staff, and specialty cigar shops.
Laws on tobacco sales to minors are also being toughened and smoking will be prohibited in vehicles used for work, such as delivery trucks. By May 31, 2008, stores will no longer be able to display cigarettes publicly on so-called "power walls."
The restrictions are designed to reduce exposure to deadly second-hand smoke, prompt more smokers to quit and dissuade others, mainly children and youths, from starting.
"I think this is a really, really signature step toward a climate ... where the ravages of second-hand smoke are no longer present and where Ontario workers will be protected from them," Smitherman said.
Health benefits of California's mid-1990s smoking ban have already shown up in statistics, with declines in six of nine tobacco-related cancers, said state health department spokesman Ken August.
The adult smoking rate in the state is now 15 per cent, down one-third since higher cigarette taxes were imposed in 1988.
About 85 per cent of Ontario municipalities, including Toronto, now have no-smoking bylaws, so the new act will create a level playing field in cities and towns across the province.
Its impact will be felt most in communities with weak or non-existent bylaws, a list that includes Windsor, Brockville, Gananoque and several other municipalities in eastern and northwest Ontario, Perley said.
Despite the fact it's on aboriginal land and could be exempt from the law, Casino Rama, which allows smoking throughout most of its complex, said it will comply. "We don't expect to see any drop in business," said spokeswoman Jenna Hunter.
Smitherman said he's worried other First Nations communities may pass bylaws to ignore the law, but will work to persuade them not to in hopes of reducing "very, very high" smoking rates among aboriginals.
Opponents of the act were out in full force yesterday, angry that the government did not provide for compensation to bar and restaurant owners who spent many thousands of dollars building separately ventilated smoking rooms permitted under municipal bylaws.
"Their concerns have been ignored," said Douglas Needham, president of the Canadian Restaurant and Foodservices Association, noting pub and bar sales have slumped 25 per cent in three years and 4,100 jobs lost.
Lobbyists for smokers' rights groups also vowed not to give up the fight against the bill.
"Just because it has been passed doesn't mean there can't be future amendments ... they (smokers) are always going to be looking to be treated with fairness and civility in the future," said Nancy Daigneault, president of Mychoice.ca, funded entirely by the Canadian Tobacco Manufacturers Association to the tune of $2.5 million.
"We had hoped the McGuinty government would have at least listened to adult smokers and treat them fairly and give them an opportunity to either have their own clubs or designated smoking rooms."
The anti-tobacco bill was strengthened from its original version, with new measures to ban smoking 24 hours a day in regulated home daycare centres, and dates set for tearing down store cigarette displays.
Those displays, for which store owners are paid thousands of dollars by tobacco firms must have any colourful advertising banners removed starting next spring and must come down entirely by May 31, 2008, with cigarettes stored out of public view.
Tobacco farmers have criticized the government for providing no more than $50 million to help them and their communities ease their dependence on tobacco. Agriculture Minister Steve Peters defended the money as the largest investment by a government in a transition strategy.
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I cant believe they want to ban smoking on patios and enterances now. This is getting way out of hand. Its bad enough that people are forced outside to begin with and now thats not even good enough?
Something needs to be done about these people.
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| quote: | Originally posted by jester
Everything in this country is illegal. |
"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery…" Winston Churchill
"If you have ten thousand regulations you destroy all respect for the law" - Winston Churchill
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