Health professionals in Auckland have proposed that smoking be banned in all outdoor public places in the city. At least I think that’s what they’ve proposed. The front-page story in this morning’s Herald isn’t entirely clear on whether the ban is intended to be universal within the Auckland City boundaries or restricted to certain public spaces.
Leaving aside for the moment the question of whether banning smoking in any outdoor public space can be justified in what we like to call ‘a free society’, a limited ban (on virtually anything) invites public confusion and is therefore much more difficult to enforce. A total ban, on the other hand, leaves no room for confusion or the excuse, ‘I didn’t realise you couldn’t smoke here.’
As I write this, a poll on the Herald’s website reports:
Excellent and sensible idea – 43%
Good in theory - 27%
Not a fan but would go along with it – 4%
Outrageous, a step too far – 26%
That’s 74% of respondents variously in favour and 26% adamantly against. An unscientific poll of course, but indicative at least of majority support for banning smoking outdoors as well as indoors in public spaces.
So yes, if there were such a law, you would essentially only be able to smoke in private indoor locations, including your home and garden, other people’s homes and gardens with their agreement, and (I’m guessing here) other privately owned indoor premises with the agreement of everyone who ever used the premises.
Put even more simply, you would not be able to smoke in any outdoor location where you might come into contact with another member of the general public – on the street, in the park, on the beach, in children’s playgrounds, tramping, climbing, jogging, playing or just plain walking.
I think it’s an excellent and sensible idea.
Smokers talk of their ‘right to smoke’ and indeed no one wants to take that right away from them. There’s really no difference between a person’s right to fill their lungs with tar and die from lung cancer and a person’s right to live on a diet of junk food and sugar drinks and die of a diabetes-related condition or a heart attack. Please feel free.
But there is no right to pollute the air that others breathe with your smoke, including, I would suggest, your own family’s air, whether in the home or in the car. Especially in the car!
There is no such thing as a right to do harm.
Anyway, the suggested ban has brought the usual money-based objections from business and the hospitality industry:
Auckland Council member Cameron Brewer said the real epidemic the city faced was obesity, not smoking
‘Smokers’, he said, ‘have got to smoke somewhere and if you try to introduce an outdoor ban, all that will do is see more retreat inside, lighting up in the family home or car, which is much more damaging to non-smokers.’
Not a very convincing argument, since the addictive nature of smoking almost certainly means that those people light up in the family home or car now, in addition to smoking outside.
And smokers don’t have to smoke. They can beat their addiction and stop smoking as millions of others world-wide have done.
But at lease Mr Brewer acknowledges the damaging effect of smoking on non-smokers.
He was also admirably in favour of more public education on the dangers of smoking. ‘That’s what works,’ he said. ‘Municipal meddling over the years hasn’t made one bit of difference,’
Possibly not, but central government meddling certainly has made a huge difference. The ban on smoking in enclosed public spaces is the most significant reason for the decline in smoking in New Zealand over the past decade. As Heart of the City CEO, Alex Swney, observed, ‘When that was imposed people thought the world was going to end. But now it seems almost obscene that someone would light up in a restaurant. This would be the same as that – it’s just evolution.’
So there you have it – ‘Nanny State’ lurking in the wings again. I never had a nanny, but I’ve seen enough of them on telly to realise that they can be really annoying, always trying to stop you doing fun things like sticking your fork in the electric socket or swallowing a marble or shoving a crayon up Rover’s bum. But when you become a big boy or girl and can think clearly, you come to understand that Nanny really had your best interests at heart and was right all along.