The Spanish smoking ban, due to come into force on January 2, 2011, will not work. That is the view of FACUA, a Spanish consumer group.
They believe that there will not be enough inspections for the threat of punishment to work on bars and restaurants in Spain that flout the law. Furthermore, even if the bars do receive a fine, the extra smoking patrons (and therefore revenue) that these establishments attract will outweigh the cost of paying the penalty, FACUA have said. Read more here: Smoking law could be flouted due to lack of vigilance, says FACUA
This does seem logical. As FACUA points out, in the five years that the current legislation has been in force (during which time bars over 100 square meters had to have a partitioned and ventilated smoking section), not one complaint was followed up in the city of Seville.
This status quo is down to the complicated regional community system that exists in Spain: to pacify feudal spats (the most famous ones involve Catalonia and the Basque Country), every city has three entities managing it - one national, one regional and one for the city itself, a fact which paralyses the enforcement of laws such as those on smoking - each level of government denies that the smoking laws fall within their remit.
When I was in Madrid recently I went into the three biggest bars around Puerta del Sol and found them all to be openly breaking the current rules. Even the smoking area in Madrid airport's baggage hall fails to comply with the regulations - which means that the first sight a visitor to Spain has is that this is a country that can't follow its own laws.
I can't see how this will change with the new law.
So if the government(s) won't do anything about bars that openly break Spain's new smoking ban, who can? You can, using Spain's very efficient complaints system. Every bar, restaurant or other public service has an official complaints book that is regularly checked and followed up by the appropriate authorities - I can't tell you which level of government has this authority but I can tell you that, at least in this case, they do know!
Read more about Making a Complaint in Spain
Many small working class neighborhood bars are forced to ignore the currently existing bans to stay in business. As a result, Johnson and Johnson, the makers of Chantix and Nicoderm, is giving new money to it’s many tax exempt political action committees (PACs) to help lobby for more enforcement. If more enforcement is needed, they themselves admit that the statement that bans are good for business is obviously another myth.
Here are their tax exempt political action committees (PACs);
http://www.no-smoke.org/pdf/CIA_Fundamentals.pdf
And the new enforcement grant money;
http://www.rwjf.org/applications/solicited/cfp.jsp?ID=21181
Let’s hope it doesn’t work at all. Let’s hope it bombs, and I suspect that it will indeed bomb.
I live in La Manga south of Spain on a campsite, earlier this year two men came into the campsite bar where Bingo was being played. The two men said Gambling was not allowed by law. These two men only appeared due to the fact that someone on the site made a complaint about the gambling.
The same thing will happen when this smoking ban comes into place, there will always be someone out there who will complain. Someone who isn’t a smoker or is a bar owner themselves who has had to stop smoking in their bar. They go into another bar see people smoking and then they go and complain.
Many bars in Spain earn their money during the summertime between June up to September. Some even close in the winter months. Even so many bars still struggle to make huge profits especially as tourism in many parts of Spain has dropped over recent years.
I’m sure that many bars will try and ignore the ban, but there are people out there that will complain and the inspectors don’t need to go and monitor all the bars. Al it takes is some snitch to complain and give the bars name. Remember at the end of the day the people who hand out the fines make money out of it.
Here in Chicago, the bars that comply don’t snitch on their nearby competitors. They don’t want to lose the few anti-smoking patrons they have. There aren’t enough to go around to ALL the bars.
i don’t care if it works or not as long as i can stop a smoker from smoking (finally with the law behind me) when i take my family out to eat or am playing with my son at a playground. and i for one WILL enforce it in my own way if someone smokes at a restaurant or a playground that i am there. so, people may continue to smoke as long as it is not during my visit.
if the govt. is to be serious about this new lay they need to really enforce it by having a large amt. of inspectors roaming the cities/towns. the best system would be larger fines that the law-violating establishment could not justify paying by added smoker patron revenue. and failure to pay said fines should lead to the immediate forced closure of the establishment.
damian, you need to specify the places you went to when you write “When I was in Madrid recently I went into the three biggest bars around Puerta del Sol and found them all to be openly breaking the current rules” so i can see for myself since i live here full time and every place that went non-smoking or created a smoking section when the last law was passed has abided as far as my experience is concerned. for example, el museo del jam-on (probably THE biggest bar/restaurant around the puerta del sol) has been 100% non-smoking for the past 5 years (prior to that, smoking was allowed).
i believe that after some initial difficulties & resistance, the law will work.
Get real people and take off the blinkers.. Spain is a third world country that should never have been allowed into the European comunity. Its infra structure and beaurocracy are still facist! Everything is corrupt including government, public services and police and it is going down the tubes due to the fact that europe has closed the plentiful coffers that the Spanish have been plundering since Franco died. The Spanish smoking ban will not work for long because no one will enforce it. The whole smoking ban thing has nothing to do with health issues, either here or in any other country, it is just a test to see how far people can be pushed into submission. Whats next.. compulsory chipping of humans like dogs?? What happened to democracy and freedom of choice??
Seems to me and many other discerning folk who dont walk through life with their heads up their backsides, that europe is becoming a dictatorship. History has shown that people will only tollerate that in the short term and we already see anarchy rearing its head everywhere.
I live and run a business in Spain and i am sure i will find a place to drink and smoke.
In other countries it works. Why not in Spain ?
just been into town – pleased to see plenty of smoke and atmosphere still in my local – pursuaded me to drop in for a coffee
I live in Andalucia, in a market town just south of Granada. I’ve just retiurned from town and can confirm that the smoking ban is being rigorously enforced by bar owners. Everyone seems to be accepting it.
The Andalucian is correct this a 3rd world country with a government and people who have spent their time ripping off other europeans,but you will find the ban and fines will work and be highly policed but not in Spanish owned bars.
Well i think its plain stupid..most the spanish smoke when im in fuengirola in spanish / tapas places its full of spanish smoking there malboroughs…look i think it wont work, watch now the tourism fail even more now …most of us uks peeps will look at further a field non euro… i holiday in spain every summer and this has really annoyed me…another bloody britain…big bro is watchin everyone…and i will never give up smoking ban or no ban…
LaPrimavera: It doesn’t work in Holland, they’ve reversed it for the small bars. It’s a legal product which tax is paid upon, so therefore those who own pubs, bars etc should have the choice of whether or not they want smoking or not.
Comment 4 JR: Next time you take your boy to the park you’d better start getting him to wear a Michael Jackson mask. Whilst you seem to be aiming your aggression at the smoker you have totally overlooked the real danger to your kids health… the ever increasing volume of cars polluting the air with their car exhaust emissions… but you seem to overlook this fact, I wonder if it’s because you drive a car and if so you are a hypocrite.
I am opening bars where it will be compulsory to smoke.
One needs to show cigarettes as ID at the door or there is no entry.
I do not SELL liquor but there is an entry fee which covers this so I am not breaking any so called laws.
People should be able to smoke if they so wish.
As for the comments made by JR,if he came near any of my bars and tried to enforce anything………….I think mincemeat says it all.
I hope the ban will not work. The nicest thing about Spain is precisely their tolerance to others, smoking included. The “make a complaint” is so, so non Spanish to me!. I specially hope that tourists do not complain. They come to enjoy and know a place, different from their own. They should enjoy it such as is and not try to impose their standards on others. I was taught that the etiquette when travelling is: “In Rome, do as the Romans do”.
Here in Ibiza, we smokers are not happy.
I couldn’t understand why in the UK we weren’t given a choice between smoking and non-smoking establishments and I can’t understand it here either, more so given the especially central role clubs, bars and cafes play both economically and culturally.
I have no doubt that this is the death knoll for a good number of spots here – especially given the struggle they already face to make ends meet in the winter season.
I also have no doubt that this is no health-related issue, just another socio-political psy-ops deal to further soften us and condition us to accept without question an ever increasing authoritarian dominance.
Perhaps next they’ll ban drinking in bars to make sure we all stay at home and simply watch our 3D plasmas for further instruction.
Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.
Peace,
Max
So if there is a complaints book at every bar, smokers ought to start using it to protest against the ban. It isn’t just there for non-smokers to use.
Im of to spain this friday to Tormilinos for a few days break,only found out a few days about the smoking ban,not quite looking as forward to it as a was but hae ho rules are there to be broken,so will inform you on my return if we actually get smoking in any pubs but they will remain nameless of course.
I don’t really understand smokers. They don’t seem to understand that their smoke creates an unhealthy environment for others, which kills people! I don’t mind people smoking, as long as they don’t do it near me or my children. It’s a bad, dirty habit and should be completely eradicated.
A recent study shows that 11,000 people die each year in the UK due to passive smoking. Sylvia Denton, of the Royal College of Nursing says:
“Given the unarguable scientific evidence, it is now essential that policies are put into place to protect the public from exposure to other people’s smoke”
Another study affirms that second-hand smoke kills one barman a week!
I absolutely agree with forbidding smoking and I applaud Spain for going ahead with this ban. I live in Madrid and can now take my children into a restaurant without subjecting them to a face full of smoke.
WELL DONE SPAIN! (Which is NOT a third-world country, by the way!)
I have just come back from Sitges and Barcelona and did not see any evidence that the law was being ignored in the bars and restuarants I visited.
It seems to be holding steady. There are certainly people on the street smoking, but I can walk into a restaurant or bar without my eyes immediately watering up.
As for rob and his hypocrisy comment, well, I disagree. I don’t have a car here, but even if I did, cars, for better or for worse, at least serve a purpose. People should endeavor to drive less, or drive more efficient cars, but at least they serve a social and economic purpose by, say, permitting people to move around, remain employed, etc. Smoking serves absolutely no purpose whatsoever. I’m all for “give a little, get a little” but smoking is all give, and no get. Good riddance to it.
I live in Torrox, Andalucia, and, already, there are signs of ignoring/getting around the new no smoking bans. A bar I use regularly just dishes out ash trays to the people he knows, without any fear of an Inspector walking in. He commented that he might as well make some kind of living allowing his loyal customers to smoke, and if he gets fined, he will then pay it…other bars have an agreement with their smoking customers that if they get caught, everyone will put into the kitty to pay the fine…finally, there are some bars who have followed suit to Malaga, they have declared their bar to be a Private Members Smoking Establishment, the customers are charged 1 euro a year membership….these bars a full……….of smokers AND a lot of non smokers!
Does anybody else get the sense that smokers are the scapegoat for pollution ?
Perhaps that is why this entire debate is so irrational.
Smoking prevalence is now rising, tobacco consumption is more visible and more normal, and therefore the stated objective of the abolitionists; to denormalise smoking and thereby coerce abstinence, is an unmitigated failure.
Perhaps the green movement has caused widespread guilt which, through psychological transference, manifests itself as inordinate intolerance for just one, relatively minor, form of pollution.
Clearly smoking is not beneficial to ones health but nor is motoring, alcohol, chocolate, fizzy drinks, cheeseburgers, loud music or bungee jumping.
Are puritanism and utilitarianism to define politics in the 21st century ?
why o why can we not have smoking and non smoking establishments?