Should staff be given time off work to quit smoking?

At a recent meeting of the Nottingham City Health and Wellbeing Board, issues around smoking and how it is integrated into the workplace were raised.

John Wilcox, insight specialist at Nottingham City Council, explained that there is a major difference between allowing staff to smoke cigarettes at work and allowing them to inhale e-cigarettes. Nottingham Post reports that Wilcox said “it is important that organisations take time to consider those differences and how they relate to the health of their employees".

He also suggested another more progressive idea, that smokers should be given time off to quit. “Policies can go further,” he explained, “and can consider things like allowing staff time off work to help them stop smoking, considering e-smoking and where that can happen around the work place.

"All organisations do bits of that but I don't know if they do all of it."