Issue 684
24 December 2010 - 06 January 2011
www.canarianweekly.com
FREE
Gone… in a puff! New Smoking Law will hit café-bars and restaurants the most CHRISTMAS MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE TENERIFE GOVERNMENT Dear Ladies and Gentlemen: It is Christmas again, the most dearly loved time of the year, and I would like to share with you a few moments of reflection. Because, above all, that is what Christmas is about: showing our willingness to help others and strengthen the most solid values in an exchange of joy and hope. Only with hope shall we be able to face difficult situations. With spirit and determination. Christmas awakens our need to be closer to our loved ones, our family and friends with whom we share a special sense of togetherness. It is these good intentions which make us reach out to the people who need our help and support. This is why we should have confidence in the future and in our own ability to succeed…together. I wish you a very merry Christmas. Ricardo Melchior
THE Spanish Government’s tough AntiSmoking Law was finally given the green light by an overwhelming majority in the Senate on Tuesday night. The legislation, forbidding people from lighting up in enclosed public places, takes effect from 2nd January. It falls into line with most other European countries, but stronger than most, and will almost certainly have huge repercussions for hotels, restaurants, nightclubs and café-bar owners.
Congress threw out all the amendments which had been placed by opposition parties, especially the People’s Party, in an attempt to weaken the new law. Thus, all enclosed public spaces will be smoke-free, including bars and nightclubs. Sealed-off smoking areas will not be allowed, except in amusement arcades where no games can installed - and no drinks or food can be served in the smoking zones. Even smoking areas in airports, including Madrid Barajas, will be removed, while a ban has already been in place at Tenerife South airport for some time.
The home of good shopping Come & See our *NEW LOOK* Store, in Los Cristianos - now Bigger & better! Opp. Paloma Beach Apts, CC Costamar, Los Cristianos and Las Chafiras
Yet criminals will be allowed to smoke in prisons, while nursing homes, psychiatric wards, and specially-equipped theatres are exempt from the law. Hotels will be allowed to reserve 30% of their rooms for smokers, but these should always be the same, and be identified properly as such when being booked. The law will allow smoking at outside tables in restaurants and bars, and in the open air on university premises, despite a motion to make them smoke-free. But the ban remains in schools, children’s parks and in the doorways of hospitals and health centres.
A 2006 law had already barred smoking at workplaces and in public buildings such as hospitals, schools, shopping centres and railway stations. Yet the law allowed bar or restaurant owners to decide whether to authorise smoking in their establishments, which the vast majority did. But not any more. The new law also modifies the regulation of the sale, supply, consumption and advertising of tobacco. Among the new rules is the prohibition of smoking on television, after consumer complaints that this was happening in some popular programmes. Continued on page 5.