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Brya Ingram / Stuff
The Christchurch City Council has banned vaping in the city’s parks, playgrounds and bus stops.
Vaping has been banned in Christchurch parks, playgrounds and bus shelters, but the rule will not be enforced.
The Christchurch City Council on Thursday decided to add vaping to its existing smoke-free policy, which bans smoking in public outdoor places in the city.
The ban includes trails that are licensed for use in cookouts. However, it is voluntary and is not actively enforced by the council.
The move came a day after it became illegal to sell vapers to those under the age of 18 and advertising and sponsorship of vaping products were banned entirely.
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Workplaces and city hall facilities are automatically smoke and vapor free as a result of the new law, but it does not specifically apply to public places designated as smoke free by territorial authorities.
Six councilors – James Gough, Pauline Cotter, Tim Scandrett, Aaron Keown, Catherine Chu and Sam MacDonald – voted against adding vaping to politics but were defeated.
Gough said he was fully in favor of addressing an issue if it existed, but did not believe Christchurch would have a problem with “rampant vaping on the playground.”
Keown said: “The irony of this is you can take a dozen Woodies to the park and get drunk with your friends, but you can’t vape.”
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Two Maori health advocates argue that tobacco companies are simply diversifying to protect their profits by promoting vaping, and are especially targeting teenagers and Maori.
Keown said he had never heard of a police call about a vaping incident.
Deputy Mayor Andrew Turner said the policy was voluntary and worked to discourage people from smoking.
The council also considered investigating the extension of its smoke-free and vape-free policy to the pedestrian mall areas, beaches and open parking areas of the central city, but failed to garner sufficient support.
At the beginning of the meeting, Amanda Dodd, deputy director of health promotion for the Cancer Society’s West Coast division of Canterbury, said that vaping was not entirely harmless and was not intended to be a lifestyle product. .
He said that the Health Ministry had advised people that they should only vape if they were trying to quit smoking and that they should not vape if they were not smokers.
