DUP hails Martin over smoking ban
The Minister for Enterprise & Employment Micheál Martin was today personally congratulated by a senior member of the Rev Ian Paisley’s Democratic Unionists for bringing in Europe’s first ever ban on public smoking.
DUP deputy leader Peter Robinson described the decision Mr Martin took when he was Minister for Health as courageous during an address to a management conference in Belfast.
Mr Robinson welcomed the minister to KPMG’s conference in the Europa Hotel and joked that he was under instructions from his wife, Iris, the MP for Strangford, to congratulate the Cork South Central TD.
The East Belfast MP explained: “My wife, Iris, who is my party’s health spokesperson, has instructed me to pass on our congratulations to the minister on being in the vanguard of the campaign to ban smoking in enclosed public places in the Irish Republic.
“I pass on the message not only as an obedient husband but because I believe his courageous decision as Health Minister a few years ago showed that if a ban could work in the Republic it could work anywhere.
“It was a courageous decision and Micheál took a lot of heat. He was labelled ’busybody-in-chief’ and ’the Killjoy of the Emerald Isle’.
“But he came through it and many are now following his lead and most of those who opposed him have gone silent.
“I believe the decision will have a positive legacy long after all of us have left politics.”
The Republic’s ban on smoking in the workplace came into effect in March 2004.
Scotland became the first UK region to introduce a ban on smoking in public places on March 26.
Northern Ireland will introduce a total ban in April next year.
In February, MPs voted to ban smoking in all bars and private members clubs in England by summer 2007.
