Examination of Witnesses (Questions 480-497)
VICE ADMIRAL
RORY MCLEAN
OBE AND MR
CHRIS WILLIAMS
24 NOVEMBER 2005
Q480 Chairman: You are
aware of the fact that both under the last government (under Kenneth
Clarke) tax increases were put on cigarettes, effectively on public
health grounds, and also under this government they have directly
been put on cigarettes and cigarette products on the basis that
it reduces consumption?
Vice-Admiral McLean: Yes.
Mr Williams: Of course one can
also make the point that there is a duty-free price and there
is a price that is available outside in the retail area. If you
are in Gibraltar I think you will find there is very little difference
between the price that you might get inside the mess and the price
outside on the high street.
Q481 Chairman: But Germany
is quite different?
Mr Williams: Clearly location
by location there will be differences, and that is why we will
be reviewing the policy across the board.
Q482 Mike Penning: The
point you made before and it just does not equate, because if
there is no duty on cigarettes people can afford them, but in
most countries where our servicemen and women serve there has
been in the past a black market between what you can buy as a
serviceman and that is what is available to the general public
in that country. Can I move on? You discussed accommodation. For
the vast majority of single servicemen and women the barrack room
or their barracks is their home. How are you going to adapt a
policy of banning smoking if it is their home, and, secondly,
in particular to the Navy on a ship where that is their home as
well even though it is their workplace?
Vice-Admiral McLean: I will deal
with the second point first because it is probably easier. We
already have a ban inside surface ships, and so they are only
allowed to smoke on what we call the weather deck, i.e. the open
air. This is not quite as possible within submarines, for obvious
reasons, but what we have done is segregate smoking away from
the workplace and the living spaces so they are only allowed to
smoke at either end of the submarine. We expect to be able to
make submarines completely smoke-free over a period of years,
but we will have to wean our submariners off smoking in order
to achieve it. In terms of single living accommodation, to the
maximum extent possible—and this is true in larger barracks—what
we will hope to do is to have areas, smoking blocks, one complete
block, where smokers will be able to go, and other blocks which
are the completely smoke-free. In areas where that is not possible
we will segregate accommodation for use by smokers from the non-smoking
area and we will put in procedures to be able to extract smoke,
and so on and so forth. That is the only way that we can get round
that particular situation of it being a serviceman or woman's
home?
Mr Williams: The key principle
we are looking at is that those who are unwilling to be exposed
to the smoke of others will not be. That is the spirit of the
legislation, we believe, and that is what we are moving towards.
Equally, because we provide people with their homes, they live
on our premises and in many cases are directed to do so, if they
wish to remain a smoker within their own private space, if you
like, we will, where it is possible, create such an opportunity,
either by physical building construction or modification or by
segregation of smoking buildings from non-smoking buildings, but
the golden principle is that somebody who is unwilling to be exposed
to the smoke of others will not be when we have implemented our
policy.
Q483 Mike Penning: I cannot
see how this is going to be done. In basic training in most of
the Armed Forces you are in a multiple occupancy room, and you
are only offered single occupancy later on if you are lucky. Are
you telling me we are going to positively discriminate to say
that if you join the Armed Forces you should not be a smoker?
They pay for this accommodation—they pay rent these days—unlike
when I joined the Armed Forces they only paid a contribution.
This is their home. Unless you have a massive financial input
into accommodation within the Armed Forces, you are not going
to be able to do this?
Vice-Admiral McLean: The answer
to the question is that we are not going to have people in multi-accommodation
subjecting themselves to the smoke of others, and so we are going
to segregate them, and if we cannot segregate them we will say
there will be no smoking and we will provide smoking areas outside.
Q484 Mike Penning: The
implications of this I will follow with some interest?
Mr Williams: Each unit, each command,
will make a decision on the amount of provision it is prepared
to make for smoking accommodation and the amount of provision
it is prepared to make for non-smoking accommodation, and the
golden rule is that non-smokers will not be exposed unwillingly
to the smoke of others.
Q485 Jim Dowd: Submariners—I
think the expression you used was that you are going to "wean"
them off it. Does that mean that anybody who smokes cannot now
be recruited as a submariner?
Vice Admiral McLean: No, it does
not mean that. What it means is that over a period of years we
will progressively educate the submariner community down to the
non-smoking rule, because they cannot smoke in submarines at the
moment in certain operational circumstances, and we will make
it clear in our deputed policy that there will be no smoking in
submarines in the future; but that does not mean to say that an
individual submariner cannot smoke, and it also does not mean
that if the submarine were to surface in benign conditions that
the smoker could not go on the upper deck and have a smoke.
Q486 Mike Penning: The
MoD has said that it will try and implement as best as possible
the legislation but with limited exemptions. Can you highlight
the exemptions that the MoD is proposing?
Vice Admiral McLean: We have covered
two of them: one is submarines, the second is Royal Fleet Auxiliaries,
which, for those who do not understand, are tankers which carry
ammunition, and so it is impractical at the moment—a bit
like an oil or a gas rig—for people to smoke on the upper
deck. Again, the same point though, we are planning over the next
few years to gradually reduce the smoking population on board
such that they cannot smoke inside the ship, and we will make
special arrangements, when the operational circumstances allow,
for smokers to be able to smoke on the upper deck within the confines
of safety. We have talked about single living accommodation and
in messes. In messes there will be, for obvious reasons, our golden
rule, you will not be allowed to smoke within the bar area or
anything like that. A commanding officer, if he chooses, will
be able to designate an area for smoking for those who want to
do it for which we will not allow bar staff or cleaners to go
in until it has been expunged of the smoke.
Q487 Mike Penning: You
were talking there about messes, but for the junior ranks who
use the NAAFI—it is one of the most prevalent places they
go to—how is that going to be permitted? Is it a club, exemptions,
or . . . .
Admiral McLean: No, there will
be no smoking in NAAFI bars. It will be again, designated in areas
that are away from those who do not wish to smoke.
Vice-Admiral McLean: We recognise
this is a challenge, because this is a change in the way that
messes and clubs operate at the moment, but what we are advocating
is thinking of it not so much as a club but as this is a place
where people effectively live—it is their front room where
they can watch the television or read the newspaper—so we
recognise the challenge, but if the membership wishes to retain
a smoking facility within that living space, we would then have
to identify whether it is possible to create a separate smoking
area so that those who wish to use the club and not be exposed
to smoke will be able to do so and, equally, those who wish to
smoke in what is effectively their own living room will still
be able to do so with the single provision for separation having
been made.
Q488 Mike Penning: This
is all going to cost money at the end of the day. There is a financial
implication for what you have just described. In the budgets—I
used to be a defence adviser myself—where is this money
going to come from? Which financial stream is that coming in from?
Vice-Admiral McLean: The way in
which the MoD planning process works, it has now moved from an
annual to a bi-annual cycle, but what we do is we take all the
costs pressures on the department into account when we set and
allocate our resources. Some pressures go up and some areas go
down. Every two years we rebalance the defence programme between,
for example, personnel, logistics, and so on and so forth. In
the context of a government policy that has now been enacted through
Parliament, we will be obligated to fund whatever is required.
Mr Williams: I think it is also
worth making the point that it is already the case in some messes
that they have decided to go entirely non-smoking. It is also
the case that, of course, there will be financial implications
if one wishes to create a separate smoking facility which does
not already exist, and that will be judged in the normal process
of deciding what are your priorities, where do you want to spend
your money? One cannot exclude the possibility that in some cases
there will not be the money to set up a segregated smokers area,
in which case, our governing advice, it is the right of the non-smoker
not to be exposed to other's smoke that wins.
Q489 Mike Penning: So
if the budget is tight the rights of the smoker in tone will be
ignored?
Mr Williams: Not ignored, will
be put into the balance, and, like all these things, you have
to decide: how much do I want it?
Q490 Mike Penning: If
the money is not there he or she will be not be allowed to smoke,
is what you are saying?
Vice-Admiral McLean: It is highly
unlikely that we will end up trying to do a policy change on this
basis, which is going to be challenging, as Chris has already
said. It is highly unlikely that for the sums of money that we
are talking about to provide for the rights of the smokers as
well as preserve the rights of the non-smoker that we will not
find this money in defence across the board; but the specific
answer to your question: we have not costed it yet and we have
various different systems in place to be able to accommodate not
just this policy shift but other policy changes.
Mike Penning: Thank you for being so
honest.
Q491 Mr Burstow: Two quick
questions. Have you made any assessment of the impact on the health
and therefore probably the operational effectiveness of the Armed
Services arising from second-hand smoke? Is there any assessment
that you have made in terms of the health effects it has?
Vice-Admiral McLean: The answer
to that is that there have been some informal and incomplete studies
that have been done over a few years, but we have not got any
concrete, what I would call, scientific results at this stage.
That is why in the case, for example, of submarines that we are
intending to go to a complete ban in submarines over a period
of years.
Q492 Mr Burstow: Are those
incomplete studies possibly documents that could be passed to
the Committee?
Vice-Admiral McLean: The answer
is I do not know the status of those documents at the moment.
My understanding is that they are informal because the research
was incomplete.
Mr Williams: Nothing we have done
points to a different conclusion other than that we should be
trying to persuade our people to give up smoking or not to start
smoking in the first place.
Q493 Mr Burstow: There
is a benefit to be had from the point of view of your workforce?
Mr Williams: We do not challenge
that at all, no.
Q494 Mr Burstow: The other
thing I just wanted to pick up very quickly was the way in which
you were intending to roll out your policy in this respect, the
desirability of a consistent approach across all countries within
Britain, consisting of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland,
and the idea that you are going to implement this. Given that,
which of the countries are you taking the lead from in terms of
framing your policy? Is it England, is it Scotland, is it Wales,
is it Northern Ireland?
Mr Williams: What we are trying
to achieve is one policy that is a good policy and effective wherever
we serve, both in the UK and overseas. It does mean noting that
there are various administrations with their own legislative mechanisms
and we are in discussions with officials in all of the legislative
bodies. It also means that because we know Scotland is going to
implement their regulations first, that we will be taking the
implementation date for us as effectively the Scottish date.
Vice-Admiral McLean: 26 March
2006.
Mr Williams: So that is when we
will bring the spirit of the regulations instructions into force.
Q495 Dr Stoate: I was
on the Ark Royal a couple of years ago in the Navy and
I had such a good time that I am signed up for next year, so I
am going to be a post-graduate.
Vice-Admiral McLean: Welcome aboard.
Q496 Dr Stoate: I took
particular notice of the fact that sailors were not allowed to
smoke inside the ship and they went outside on the deck when they
wanted a fag, and nobody complained to me at all that that was
in any way an issue to them. Have you actually had much evidence
of complaints or resistance to this type of policy or do you think
it has just been accepted?
Vice-Admiral McLean: In the case
of the surface Navy, and I have been part of that for many years,
we have been engaged in this aggressive anti-smoking policy for
quite some time. The difference with submarines is that they do
not have the opportunity to go up on deck. A submarine is a highly
complex piece of kit and therefore we have many different types
of skilled trades, and what we are trying to preserve at the moment
is we do not want non-smokers to go and we do not want smokers
to go until we have got to the point when we can go completely
non-smoking. I have not had brought to my attention any formal
representations, although within the submarine community they
are a very close band of brothers, they rely on each other heavily,
and therefore they are quite tolerant of each other in that environment.
Whether there are any formal representations in the system I would
need notice of that but, more importantly, we do continuous attitude
surveys all the time and it has never been brought up other than
in the spirit of co-operation where some messes have decided that
they will not smoke anyway.
Q497 Dr Stoate: The other
thing I noticed was that sailors were extremely unlikely to drink
once they had left port. I was quite fascinated by that. The sailors
might drink heavily when they are on shore but once the ship sails
they almost do not drink at all, even the ratings do not. Do you
feel as though you would have any difficulty implementing these
things or do you think the Services support broadly what the Government
is trying to do and what the Armed Forces are trying to do and
accept the policy without much resistance?
Vice-Admiral McLean: The answer
to that question is that the head of each of the Services is fully
behind the spirit of the legislation. It will be perceived in
a different way between the Navy which has probably been doing
it for longer and the Air Force who have had very strict rules
for obvious reasons. I think the most difficult area, or the most
challenging area I should say will be to implement it within the
Army.
Mr Williams: The Admiral gave
a snapshot of the figures as they currently are, and sometimes
we can detect a trend in the way that we are measuring, and the
trend is actually downwards in all three Services. It is a general
decline and obviously we would hope that not just the military
health education but also the general civilian population health
education will be pushing in the same direction on that.
Dr Stoate: Thank you very much.
Chairman: Could I thank you both very
much indeed for coming along and assisting us with this inquiry
and also for the written memorandum, which was very informative,
Vice-Admiral. Thank very much indeed.
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