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Issue No. 146 | 26 July 2002 |
Crean-ite Is Not A Dirty Word
Interview: Trans Tasman Cole-Watch: The Full Story Unions: The Right To A Life Bad Boss: Phoenix Rising Politics: The Virtuous State International: The Champions History: Mandatory Mums Corporate: Network Governance Review: Navigating The Doublespeak Satire: Hector The Galah Found Hiding Poetry: Eight Days a Week
League to Blow Whistle on Sweat Shops Rados Shames Ruddock Into Action Virgin Contracts Spark Wage Rage Big Tobacco Turns to Union-Busting Athens Workers Pay Ultimate Price Cranes At Risk in �August Winds� Abbott�s Savings To Cost Workers
The Soapbox The Locker Room Postcard Week in Review Bosswatch
Kangaroo Court Horrifies Reader Site Reunites Redundant Workers Carr Off Course The Banners of Greed Join The Party Shocks and Stares
Labor Council of NSW |
News Big Tobacco Turns to Union-Busting
A new British Medical Journal (BMJ) report on smoke-free workplaces outlines the huge profit losses facing tobacco corporations from a ban on smoking in the workplace. The report states that in 1992 the Phillip Morris Tobacco Company privately estimated that if all workplaces were smoke-free total consumption would drop about 10 per cent through a combination of quitting and cutting down. However the California researchers, who wrote this report, estimate that smoke-free workplaces would reduce total cigarette consumption by 29%. The LHMU Hospitality Union has welcomed today's report. " Our union is at the cutting edge of the fight to ban workplace smoking because our members know that smoky pubs, clubs and casinos risk workers' health," Tim Ferrari, LHMU Assistant National Secretary said. Tim Ferrari represents hospitality workers, and their union, on the NSW Cabinet Office working group looking at planned legislation for smoking in licensed premises. In the ACT Gil Anderson, the LHMU Secretary will be mov a motion at the ACT ALP Branch conference tomorrow urging the ACT Government to review legislation for smoking in licensed premises. Other LHMU branches have mounted similar pressure on State and Territory Labor Governments. " The authors of the report state that the tobacco industry fights hard against any laws to ban smoking in the workplace because they are aware that this would reduce cigarette consumption by nearly a third," Tim Ferrari said. The BMJ report states that in the US alone if smoking was banned in the workplace the tobacco industry would lose $A 3.5 billion and if the same happened in Britain the industry would lose over $A 700 million. The report's author, Professor Stanton Glantz, comments that:" this loss in revenue explains why the industry fights so hard against legislation to ensure that workplaces become smoke-free." The BMJ report on workplace smoking was completed by Professor Stanton Glantz, Professor of Medicine, Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education, University of California, San Fransisco, USA. The California researchers reviewed 26 studies on the effects of smoke-free workplaces in the USA, Australia, Canada and Germany. You can read the British Medical Journal report here
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