FOI request (FOI224611)

e-cigarettes and vaping

Requested Wed 27 September 2017
Responded  Wed 27 September 2017

1. Please supply me with a copy of your council's policy on the use of e-cigarettes on council premises. This includes all council owned or leased buildings (for example, libraries, offices, museums), council owned or leased property (for example, parks, gardens, and other areas that form part of the grounds of council offices), and vehicles (for example, council owned or leased cars and vans). 
2. Please inform me if staff are required to leave their place of work (for example, their desk or vehicle) to vape. 
3. Please inform me if staff and visitors have to leave the grounds of council owned or leased property to vape. 
4. Please inform me if staff and visitors are required to use designated smoking areas on council owned or leased property in order to vape. 
5. Please inform me if your council's policy on the use of e-cigarettes differs in any way from your council's existing policy on smoking. If it does, please explain the differences. 
6. Please detail your council's policy, if there is one, for staff smoking cessation and also if you encourage your staff to use e-cigarettes as a means of smoking cessation. 
7. Please inform me when your policy on the use of e-cigarettes was last reviewed, if it is under review, and/or if it is due to be under review in the near future. 
8. The Government's Tobacco Control Plan explicitly states that "Public Health England has produced guidance for employers and organisations looking to introduce policies around e-cigarettes and vaping in public and recommend such policies to be evidence based. PHE recommends that e-cigarette use is not covered by smokefree legislation and should not be routinely included in the requirements of an organisation's smokefree policy". If the council has not reviewed its policy since the publication of this control plan, does it have any plans to do so in the future? 
9. Are councillors due to debate/discuss the Government's Tobacco Control Plan and/or Public Health England's advice on vaping policies? 

Response

1.Please see attached copy of our Policy as requested.

2. Yes, staff and visitors are required to leave their place of work to vape.

3. Yes, staff and visitors do have to leave the grounds of council owned or leased property to vape

4. There are no designated smoking areas

5. No

6. Please see policy

7. The policy is reviewed annually

8. The Council has not reviewed its policy since the introduction of the control plan but does intend to review the policy imminently.

9. Information not held

Attachments

• FOI224611_Smoking_Policy_Rev_October_2013.doc