US embassy cable - 05MADRID1618

UNCLAS MADRID 001618 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR OES/IHA AND EUR/WE; DEPARTMENT ALSO PASS TO 
ESTH COLLECTIVE; HHS FOR OS/OGKA/BUDASHEWITZ 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: SOCI, SP, Other 
SUBJECT: SPAIN'S NEW TOBACCO CONTROL LAW CLEARS FIRST HURDLE 
 
REF: MADRID 286 
 
1.  Spain's tough new tobacco control law was approved by the 
nation's Council of Ministers April 22 and forwarded to the 
lower house of Congress, where it is expected to be approved 
before Spain shuts down for the summer.  The law (see reftel 
for complete details) bans all tobacco advertising (as 
required by EU Directive 2003/33), prohibits smoking in 
public and private workplaces, and greatly limits smoking in 
other public places. 
 
2.  The Council of Ministers resisted union pressure to alter 
the draft law submitted by the Health Ministry to allow for 
the creation of limited and regulated smoking zones in public 
and private workplaces.  Indeed, the Council made relatively 
few changes to the Health Ministry draft.  The major new 
element in the bill sent to Congress was the delineation of 
proposed fines, which had been left out of the Health 
Ministry proposal.  In this regard, the Council of Ministers 
disappointed many anti-tobacco activists by opting for 
relatively small fines. 
 
3.  The draft bill sent to Congress imposes a maximum 30 euro 
fine on individuals who smoke in prohibited areas.  The draft 
sets minimum 600 euro, maximum 10,000 euro fines for 
establishments that permit smoking in areas where it 
prohibited or those that sell tobacco to minors.  The most 
serious fines (between 10,000 and 600,000 euros) are reserved 
for those who violate the tobacco advertising prohibition. 
 
4.  Most observers believe the bill will be approved by 
Congress and become the law of the land on January 1, 2006. 
The former ruling People's Party (PP) has criticized the bill 
as "excessively restrictive" and has urged less focus on 
punishing current smokers and more emphasis on preventing the 
young from beginning to smoke. 
 
5.  COMMENT:  Anti-smoking forces are pleased the government 
held firm on the workplace smoking ban but annoyed that the 
proposed fines appear low.  With this law, Spain will stop 
being a permissive "outlier" and will join many of its EU 
partners in ratcheting up pressure on smokers. Of course, the 
law will mean little if it is not enforced, and Spain has a 
history of not enforcing previous efforts to restrict public 
smoking.  The law, as drafted, will put the burden of smoking 
prohibition enforcement on regional/autonomous community 
authorities and largely limit the central government's role 
to enforcing the ban on tobacco advertising and sales.  All 
said and done, the law is a good start and, for Spain, 
represents a revolutionary step to tackle one of the nation's 
key public health priorities. 
 
6.  FACTS AND FIGURES ADDENDUM: media reports of the Council 
of Minister's decision included some facts and figures of 
potential interest that were not available when reftel was 
prepared. 
 
-- smoking is responsible for 50,000 deaths a year in Spain, 
representing 16 percent of all deaths of those over the age 
of 35. 
 
--  92,334,000,000 cigarettes were consumed in Spain in 2003, 
representing 2,270 cigarettes per inhabitant. 
 
--  Spaniards spent 9,526,000 euros on tobacco in 2003, 
representing 234.38 euros per inhabitant. 
 
--  the tobacco industry accounts for 59,400 "direct" jobs 
(18,000 in growing tobacco leaf, 9,000 in transforming leaf 
into tobacco products, and 32,400 in tobacco product 
distribution) and 30,600 "indirect" jobs (mostly employees of 
tobacco companies). 
 
--  tobacco taxes contributed approximately six million