LONDON — A British ban on people smoking in cars with children will take effect before the next election after lawmakers voted for the policy Monday night, Prime Minister David Cameron’s spokesman said.
Members of the House of Commons voted 376 to 107 for an amendment to the Children and Families Bill giving the health secretary the power to make it an offense for a driver to allow anyone to smoke in a vehicle when children are present.
“The intention is for the secondary regulation to be in force ahead of the next election,” the spokesman, Jean- Christophe Gray, told reporters here Tuesday. National elections take place in May 2015.
The ban was an opposition Labour Party proposal. The party cited a letter published in the British Medical Journal Feb. 7 signed by 500 doctors and nurses as evidence of its widespread support.
Cameron missed the free vote as he toured areas of southwest England affected by flooding. Gray said Monday that while the premier “understands the concerns that some have expressed, his view is that the time for this kind of approach has come.”
The vote split the cabinet, with Conservative Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith and fellow Tory Justice Secretary Chris Grayling voting against the ban.
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who leads the Liberal Democrats, opposes the ban, though he said Jan. 30 he thinks smoking with children in cars is “stupid.”
“The question is, is it right to have a law every time you see something you don’t like,” Clegg told LBC radio. “Laws and legislation are not always the solution.”
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