As one employer learned recently, smoke-free workplace legislation has teeth.
According to a Nunavut government press release, a government safety officer, in a workplace inspection, “observed evidence of smoking in the workplace.”
The moving company was charged under the Nunavut Environmental Tobacco Smoke Work Site Regulations, made under that Territory’s Safety Act, with failing to control the exposure of workers to environmental tobacco smoke at an enclosed work site. The company was sentenced to a fine of $2,000, plus a 15% Victim of Crime Surcharge.
The government’s press release states, “It is important that all employers provide safe work environments by prohibiting smoking in an enclosed work site, and outside the enclosed work site within a three metre radius of any entrance to or exit from the site.”
