Health Concerns of the staff of the House
Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
My Lords, I declare an interest as a trustee of the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation. In view of the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Trumpington, I can say that both my parents were smokers: my mother died at 60 and my father at 65, both of diseases related to smoking. I think that that counters the point that our parents lived long because they were smokers or because it did not affect them.
It seems to me that there are two central themes in the Administration and Works Committee report, the bulk of which I very strongly support. I thank the Lord Chairman for producing such a thoughtful and helpful report. The first theme is that not only is passive smoking unpleasant for everyone—or almost everyone—who has to put up with it but the committee agrees with the Chief Medical Officer and every other objective medical expert that it is dangerous to health.
It is interesting that the code of practice on workplace smoking contained in the Houses of Parliament Health and Safety Risk Management Manual states:
"Evidence suggests that those exposed to passive smoke are at increased risk of illness including lung cancer, nasal cancer and heart disease. In addition, passive smoking can trigger or aggravate respiratory conditions such as asthma or bronchitis. It can also irritate eyes, cause coughs or headaches and generally make non-smokers feel ill, uncomfortable and unpleasant".
In making my second point, I quote from the minutes of the Administration and Works Committee held on 16 November. They state:
"The Committee recognised that staff had valid health concerns, and agreed the principle that staff should be entitled to work in a smoke-free environment".
I suggest that today we must judge the recommendations and proposed amendments against those criteria. If we do so, we can quickly decide that the amendments in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, Lord Palmer and Lord Monson, fail to meet the criteria set by the committee and the code of practice.
How do the committee's recommendations match up to its own criteria and that of the code of practice? They match up pretty well, except in one important respect. If our aim is to protect our staff from the effects of passive smoking, there can be no justification for exempting the Peers' Guest Room from the new arrangements. There is no air extraction system in the room, apart from opening the windows. It would be completely useless to install one, even if it could be done without destroying the fabric of the room.
All the evidence suggests that unless an extraction fan has the power of a tornado and is located over the heads of all smokers, it does not reduce the pollution of the air for everyone. Imagining that an extraction system can remove smoke in a room such as the Peers' Guest Room is like assuming that you can swim in a chlorine-free path in a swimming pool.
I shall certainly support the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, and the remainder of the report.