#TOBACCOBILL
D E W A L F Y L P E E D S I COisBaIthLreLat to rights of individuals, NEWeTnt’Os inBteArfC erence usiness Governm bad for small b d an rs e n w o y rt e private prop
Courtesy of the Free
Market Foundation
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coalition of 14 associations, representing more than 1.3 million South Africans working in the restaurant, tavern and hospitality industry, and in small business, have written to government to voice their collective dismay over the extreme measures proposed in new tobacco legislation. “The Department of Health’s proposed measures to tighten smoking regulations under the Draft Control
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of Tobacco Products and Electronic Delivery Systems Bill are excessive and infringe disproportionately on the fundamental rights of individuals and private property owners. They are unconstitutional and have damaging economic implications,” says Leon Louw of the Free Market Foundation. The regulations, if approved, will see an effective ban on smoking in any public place and will make the dedicated smoking areas in public
establishments – required by existing regulations – obsolete, despite the hundreds of millions of rands spent by small businesses to construct these areas. Smoking will be prohibited in any “enclosed” public or workplace, or in a private home if one employs a domestic worker, engages in commercial childcare, schooling or tutoring, or any other place that is within a “prescribed distance” of an operable window, ventilation inlet, entrance or exit of such private homes or enclosed places. The
