The Fan Manufacturers’Association has added its voice to the Government’s consultation on a smoking ban with a robust defence of ventilation based upon field research carried out by the University of Glamorgan which is due to be published in full later this year. Geoff Lockwood,Chairman of the Fan Manufacturers’Association who have written to all MPs and members of the Scottish Parliament,Welsh Assembly and Northern Ireland Legislative Assembly comments:“This report gives us an opportunity to present the real case for ventilation to regulators and to address some of the uninformed comments that ventilation is ineffective.Ventilation plays a vital role in protecting people from potentially hazardous substances in all sorts of processes.Once people believe that ventilation is ineffective against one pollutant they will start to question whether it is effective against others.This would be very damaging for workers everywhere as well as for our industry.”
Dr Geens of University of Glamorgan said:“We have now run tests in ten pubs for a variety of organisations,and the results are remarkably similar.A well-directed flow of fresh air will cut contamination by around 90 percent and keep it at very low levels – well within any safety limits.In one of our tests we actually found that carbon monoxide was higher in a nonsmoking pub than in a wellventilated smoking one – which just goes to show that there are many other sources of potentially dangerous gases than just smoking (in this case probably the taxis and buses outside).At very low ventilation rates,such as recently demonstrated by a team at the EU Commission Joint Research Centre,you can only see a small effect but at the higher levels that we were testing the results are very clear,as well as being practical for operators to install.”
Geoff Lockwood continues:“We are determined to set the record straight and get legislators to accept the role ventilation plays in protecting the public from potentially hazardous substances in smoke. This report gives us a real chance to show how proban groups have misrepresented the issue in the past by giving ventilation a bad name.For instance their demands that ventilation should reduce contaminant levels in air from tobacco smoke to zero are clearly nonsense.Many of these potentially harmful constituents can be found in the ‘fresh air’ supply,but even cheap ventilation systems will help reduce the levels to within limits set by safety authorities.
“We also need to tackle the widespread belief that ventilation is expensive and needs continuous monitoring by showing that even simple systems can be effective.
There’s no doubt it’s time the industry stood up for itself - so we’re making sure this report gets into the hands of a wider audience.If we succeed in convincing Government to get behind the ventilation option it will open up a huge market for sales of systems to the licensed trade.”
Colin Vine whose Twickenham-based company Fan Installation Services specialises in putting ventilation systems into pubs agrees that installers can use the report findings to help drive sales.He explains:"A number of the systems I’ve installed have been tested by Andrew Geens,so I’m pleased that this report is being used to tell people what those of us in the business already know - ventilation really does work. It’s great news for the trade and I’ll certainly be taking along copies of this report when I go to see potential customers.”
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