Cafe Piatto owner Ziad Basheer serves Shenee Mabalhin-Bobrige and Jenna McClaren on Rundle St. Picture: Calum Robertson Source: the Advertiser
RESTAURANTS displaying no-smoking signs in outdoor areas would get a discount on permit fees under a new plan.
The significant reduction on outdoor dining permit fees will also apply to cafes and pubs that display the signs.
Councillor Michael Henningsen tonight will move that the council investigate the concept to help reduce smoking in the city.
A 25 per cent discount, worth an average of $215 a year, would be offered to permit holders prepared to display no-smoking signs on their tables and actively enforce the condition.
Mr Henningsen said the system would be self-monitored and the council would have no legal power to enforce the rule. But it would be able to remove the discount if a permit holder was non-compliant.
There are 325 outdoor dining permits in the city, issued at an average of $860. if half took up the offer, the council would lose about $35,000 in annual income.
Mr Henningsen said the council would canvas businesses before proceeding with the plan. of the six businesses The Advertiser approached yesterday, none were prepared to implement the no-smoking signs.
Ziad Basheer, the owner of Cafe Piatto in Rundle St, said councils should implement smoking bans across the board, rather than leaving it up to individual businesses.
"the 25 per cent discount is a good incentive, but as long as there is a choice most places will maintain a smoking area," he said.
Lord Mayor Stephen Yarwood said the plan could be part of a "major overhaul of outdoor dining in the city". "I'd welcome discussion to look at everything we can possibly do to turn the city into an outdoor dining mecca," he said. "we need to reduce fees and make it easier for businesses to go through the permit process."
Separately, the Cancer Council has called a new ad campaign opposing tobacco plain packaging laws misleading.
The Alliance of Australian Retailers - backed by tobacco giants British American Tobacco and Philip Morris - has placed an ad in today's Advertiser asserting plain packaging will make it easier for criminals to sell cheap counterfeit cigarettes to children as young as 14.
Cancer Council chief Professor Ian Oliver said the suggestion was "absurd".
Health Minister Nicola Roxon suspected the ad was "just the beginning of a large and co-ordinated campaign by big tobacco".
- with Tom Dougherty
<a href="http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/ipad/cheaper-permit-plan-to-stop-smoking/story-fn6bqphm-1226045221006tag:news.google.com,2005:cluster=http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/ipad/cheaper-permit-plan-to-stop-smoking/story-fn6bqphm-1226045221006Tue, 26 Apr 2011 13:54:15 GMT 00:00">Cheaper permit plan to stop smoking
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