14/05/2009 - Pub`s smoking revolt is stubbed out
A pub landlady`s ingenious bid to save her business by allowing drinkers to avoiding no-smoking laws has been stubbed out.
Takings quadrupled at the appropriately-named Cutting Edge in South Yorkshire after Kerry Fenton created a `smoking-research room`.
She had found what she thought was a loophole in the Smoke-Free (Exemptions and Vehicles) Regulations 2007, which in certain circumstances allows "research into smoking".
So she turned her back room, which has no through bar, into a vox populi centre for smokers - and very popular it was, too.
She told the Yorkshire Post newspaper: "Before Friday we were lucky to get 10 people in at a weekend. On Friday we had 29, on Saturday 31 and on Sunday 46."
But although she dutifully quizzed drinkers on how many cigarettes they smoked daily, and sought their opinions on a smoke-filled pub atmosphere, it was not to be.
Says a spokeswoman for Barnsley Council: "An officer will visit the pub to advise the pub management that they have misunderstood the relevant legislation, and that clearly the smoking-research room is in breach of non-smoking legislation."
Copyright © Press Association 2009
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