Smokers Are Finding it Harder to Take Breaks in the European Workplace

Smoking inside the workplace has been banned by legislation in many European countries. Now the issue has moved to the outside, with many employers trying to think of ways to stop their employees from smoking at all during work hours. When it comes to breaks, smokers are finding that they are no longer able to light up as easily as they used to. Philip Tobin, head of a small e-commerce company in Dublin Ireland says: "With the ban in Ireland, smokers now assume they can take four breaks a day. At 15 minutes a break, that's an hour a day of lost work. And it's unfair on the other employees."

Tobin caused a great deal of controversy across Europe when he placed a help-wanted advertisement that stated "Smokers need not apply". A British member of the European Parliament asked the European Commission to rule as to whether the advertisement breached European law. The answer was "no". The commissioner for employment, social affairs and equal opportunities, Vladimir Spidla, said that the anti-discrimination laws in place in the EU do not cover the rights of smokers.

According to Arnold Dillon, a spokesman for the Irish Business and Employers Federation, said that the commission's response on the matter "won't have an effect on working practices." But the trend does seem to be moving towards an anti-smoking approach. Some local government and health authorities in England and Scotland have prohibited smoking on their property. This has made smoking breaks impossible for employees. For example, Nottingham City Council, which issued a total smoking ban on all of its sites, both inside and outside, invited reporters to watch the demolition of a shelter used for employees to smoke, on the day the ban came into effect in December 2005. In other parts of local council government authorities in England, such as Tower Hamlets in London, they require smokers to work longer hours to make up for the time spent taking smoking breaks.

Neil Rafferty, a spokesman for Freedom Organization for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco, said: "The break issue is becoming increasingly controversial". He sees the decreasing rights of smokers as a "state sector problem".

Johan Bark, a health and safety official for Svensk Handel, a Swedish trade federation, said "In Sweden, many shops have rules that employees have to smoke away from the shop when clients come in".

Catelene Passchier, who is in charge of social policy and labour law for the European Trade Union Conference said: "some smokers are complaining that they're marginalized." She went on to stress the need to "solve the issues in dialogue." To achieve this goal, Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, or Acas, offers a step-by-step guide to developing an effective company smoking policy on its web site, www.acas.org.uk. With the ban in effect in the whole of Scotland, shortly be take place in the rest of Britain, Acas recommends getting together a task force made up of both smoking and non-smoking employees to avoid any kind of discord.

At present, breaks are the focus of debate. Further restrictions of smokers could be put in place. The World Health Organization in Geneva announced in 2005 that it would no longer be hiring anyone who smokes or refuses to stop smoking. The UN agency said its credibility was at stake because of its anti-tobacco stance. The businessman in Dublin, Tobin, said that his main reason for refusing to consider smokers was economic. He said that smokers are "a financial liability." Statistics also show that smokers take more time off sick and are more likely to contract chronic illnesses, than non-smokers. Chronic illness can increase a company's health insurance costs for employees who are smokers.

However, others suggest that refusing to even consider a smoker as a potential candidate is discrimination, when the real culprit is smoking. The debate continues.

Source:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/10/24/business/workcol25.php