Smoking: the office partition

The Environmental Health Department strongly recommends that businesses and organisations develop and implement a written smoke free policy to be communicated to all staff. This policy should state the law and the procedures to follow in the event of a non-compliance.

Smokers are still free to take cigarette breaks outside the office as before, but the existing law remains that unauthorised breaks can lead to dismissal.

The desktop dilemma
Alison Jeffreys, a training organiser in Coventry, says she's becoming increasingly frustrated because she's the one left answering the phone when her smoking workmates aren't at their desks.

'I used to lie and say they were in a meeting, but I'm just so fed up with it now that I tell the truth and say they've gone out for a fag,' she explains. 'I don't see why I should make it easy for them. After all, I'm not getting as many breaks as they are.'

But Linda, a smoker who works in an insurance company in Birmingham, says she suffers harassment from anti-smokers at work.

'I work with a couple of people who seem to spend their time just trying to make my life a misery,' she says. 'I don't smoke in the office, but they still give me grief if I go outside. They choose to ignore the extra work I do to make up for my smoking breaks.'

The government predicts an estimated 600,000 people will give up smoking as a result of the law change, and this will certainly seep through to the workplace with fewer fag-breaks. But will the new law appease the existing antagonism in the office? And will it be enough to offset the extra fag-break time for those offices who will have to get rid of their designated areas?

The jury's out...