Zach LarkinsMORE EGG ON THEIR FACES
Our government funded television network, the CBC, seems to have a little secret. Employees at their downtown Toronto headquarters are legally lighting up inside two smoking lounges outfitted with plush sofas and ashtrays. No one else in Ontario is allowed to have a smoking room. The closest anyone can come is to set up a two sided, unheated shelter, outside the premises, with a roof to keep the snow and rain off those who wish to have a smoke while they're out somewhere. Oh, wait. That only applies to casinos and Legion halls. Bars and restaurants can't have them.
The CBC says its workers can smoke in similar designated rooms at its locations in Montreal, Moncton, St. John's, Nfld., and Saint John, N.B. The CBC's smoking lounges are perfectly legal because of a loophole in federal law. The Non- Smokers' Health Act (NSHA), which came into effect in 1989, allows designated smoking areas in federally regulated workplaces. That means that even in provinces like Ontario -- where such smoking rooms are banned -- airports, television broadcasters, ports and other employers that fall under Ottawa's jurisdiction can maintain a ventilated space for smoking if they choose. I don't know if Indian reservations are considered a workplace or not, but maybe that's why the province still allows smoking anywhere on one. They come under federal jurisdiction.
Ontario Minister of Health Promotion Jim Watson has written letters complaining about the lounges to both federal Health Minister Tony Clement and federal Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn, whose department oversees federal workplaces. His next step, he says, is to write to the president of the CBC and say notwithstanding the fact that technically they have the right to under the federal law, these smoking lounges should be shut down. Give the man credit for trying to be consistent after he embarrassed himself by reversing his stance when he allowed the casinos and Legion halls to install shelters. Then again, we've come to expect hypocrisy from politicians, haven't we?
A spokesperson for the CBC told Global News the smoking rooms have existed for years, and it would be too expensive to decommission them now. No one cared that bar and restaurant owners saw the thousands of dollars they spent installing DSR's flushed down the crapper. The provincial government left them hanging in the wind and said they would not reimburse anyone as much as one cent for the funds they had invested. The NSHA has a provision to allow employers to designate smoking rooms and smoking areas and these facilities must meet certain standards for the protection of employees at their place of work. Sure sounds like what the DSR's were all about. And employees didn't even have to enter them if they didn't want to.
A double standard? To be sure. Hypocrisy? Certainly. This Liberal government just gets more egg on its face everytime it turns around.
Sources: Sean O'Shea & Kelly Patrick CBC's Little Secret Global News & National Post
The CBC says its workers can smoke in similar designated rooms at its locations in Montreal, Moncton, St. John's, Nfld., and Saint John, N.B. The CBC's smoking lounges are perfectly legal because of a loophole in federal law. The Non- Smokers' Health Act (NSHA), which came into effect in 1989, allows designated smoking areas in federally regulated workplaces. That means that even in provinces like Ontario -- where such smoking rooms are banned -- airports, television broadcasters, ports and other employers that fall under Ottawa's jurisdiction can maintain a ventilated space for smoking if they choose. I don't know if Indian reservations are considered a workplace or not, but maybe that's why the province still allows smoking anywhere on one. They come under federal jurisdiction.
Ontario Minister of Health Promotion Jim Watson has written letters complaining about the lounges to both federal Health Minister Tony Clement and federal Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn, whose department oversees federal workplaces. His next step, he says, is to write to the president of the CBC and say notwithstanding the fact that technically they have the right to under the federal law, these smoking lounges should be shut down. Give the man credit for trying to be consistent after he embarrassed himself by reversing his stance when he allowed the casinos and Legion halls to install shelters. Then again, we've come to expect hypocrisy from politicians, haven't we?
A spokesperson for the CBC told Global News the smoking rooms have existed for years, and it would be too expensive to decommission them now. No one cared that bar and restaurant owners saw the thousands of dollars they spent installing DSR's flushed down the crapper. The provincial government left them hanging in the wind and said they would not reimburse anyone as much as one cent for the funds they had invested. The NSHA has a provision to allow employers to designate smoking rooms and smoking areas and these facilities must meet certain standards for the protection of employees at their place of work. Sure sounds like what the DSR's were all about. And employees didn't even have to enter them if they didn't want to.
A double standard? To be sure. Hypocrisy? Certainly. This Liberal government just gets more egg on its face everytime it turns around.
Sources: Sean O'Shea & Kelly Patrick CBC's Little Secret Global News & National Post
