Wednesday 2 March 2011

Essex police in roadside smoking ban operation

An Essex campaign against smoking in commercial vehicles, outlawed under smoking ban legislation in England since July 2007, will involve the police.
Chris Kitchen, acting head of environmental services at Tendring District Council in Essex said: “Police together with council officers will be stopping business vehicles and public transport vehicles on the highway.
"We have noticed that people are smoking in commercial vehicles where in fact it's banned and we will be looking for evidence that people have been smoking."
The campaign aims to raise awareness but will also result in action both against drivers who smoke and their employers.

I'm not aware of the police being involved in smoking ban enforcement generally. Clearly their resources are being diverted from real crimes in order to focus on this operation. Their funding will be safe, then.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can't see how 'looking for evidence' can possibly lead to a prosecution. What would they find ? It is not an offense to put cigarette ends in an ashtray nor is it an offence to have packs of cigs/tobacco etc. in a commercial vehicle.
The 'offense' is to be in POSSESSION of a LIT cigarette.
So there is no point looking for any evidence. Anything found would not stand up in court for a prosecution.
They are relying on peoples ignorance of the Law on this one !!

Anonymous said...

Evidence makes no difference. A few months back a lorry driver was arrested for allegedly smoking when he was only using an e-cig, not smoking. The arresting officer's testimony was taken for her word with no evidence what-so-ever and a huge penalty fine was issued to the lorry driver, even though no evidence existed proving him guilty of his crime. The fact of evidence or not is of no consequence. Anything that can be used to portray the driver as a smoker, whether smoking was involved or not, will be the thing to condemn and vilify, no actual evidence or justice will be needed. They don't call them Smoke-Nazis for nothing.

Anonymous said...

TOBACCO CONTROL IS OUT OF CONTROL.