smokers to be banned from Austria's cafes

After years of heated public debate, Austria's govt determined on Friday that it will ban smoking in cafes and eating places in 2018, having passed a legislation six years in the past that forced eateries to seal off non-smoking areas. The chamber of commerce said it was watching at taking legal steps towards the ban in a nation famed for its cafe culture and where smoking is above European averages. France, Britain, Italy and some German provinces have presented identical bans.

Cafe homeowners who go entirely smoke-free by means of July 2016 will get a special one-off bonus to offset fees as a minimum in part. "we're strengthening the safety of non-people who smoke in Austria, but also take into account the interests of corporations which have already invested within the spatial separation of smokers and non-smokers," APA information company quoted Conservative economic climate Minister Reinhold Mitterlehner as pronouncing.

But now not everybody was once satisfied. "first-rate. What are we going to do? You understand that Austrians like to smoke once they drink espresso," said Elzin Nicevic, supervisor of a cafe on Vienna's Ring boulevard. The top of Austria's proper-wing Freedom celebration, Heinz-Christian Strache, whose occasion is neck and neck in opinion polls with the 2 centrist coalition events, said he would scrap the legislation will have to his get together win parliamentary elections in 2018. "We don't want enforced joys equivalent to this failure of a legislation," the heavy smoker mentioned of the invoice, which parliament is predicted to move inside months.  -Reuters