Published 21 November 2008, doi:10.1136/bmj.a2679
Cite this as: BMJ 2008;337:a2679

News

Dutch health minister announces measures to enforce smoking ban

Tony Sheldon

1 Utrecht

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

The Dutch health minister, Ab Klink, has announced tough measures to enforce the smoking ban in the hospitality sector after a rebellion among small cafes in city centres threatened to spread across the country.

Almost all the cafes in the centre of Den Bosch, in the south of the country, were defying the ban this week and were photographed returning ashtrays to tables. Similar action is reported in Nijmegen, Tilburg, and Utrecht, with as many as 12 000 cafes involved.

In response Mr Klink wrote to MPs saying, "Let there be no misunderstanding. The cabinet takes this seriously. In this country laws are to be followed and that goes for everyone."

He announced that in addition to the administrative fines imposed by the Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority, the law of "economic offences" will now come into force. This means that higher fines can be imposed more swiftly in . . . [Full text of this article]


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