So cranky - kids and second hand smoke

CallMeAl

I’m so irate. DD went to vacation care at a local gym on Friday and when we went to pick her up there was a strong smoke smell in their courtyard emanating from the neighbouring properties courtyard. We had to go stand somewhere else as it was so close by and strong.

When DD came out, she reported that people were smoking in the neighbouring courtyard when they went out for lunch, and she tried to show the supervisor but they didn’t do anything. Those little kids (she’s in Y1 and most kids there were around the same size) had to spend presumably at least half an hour to an hour out there breathing in strong second hand smoke even after she had told them about it.

I spoke to the person there as I was leaving, and they said they didn’t have another outside space and the kids couldn’t eat indoors due to contamination fears or some blah blah. And I said I can see how that made them feel stuck but keeping the kids out there in the smoke wasn’t an appropriate option. She’s said she’ll pass it on, and I’ve written to the place about it as well.

Am I overreacting? I hate the smell of smoke, it bugs me even from a distance so perhaps I’m more sensitive to this issue than others might be. But it would be bad enough if it was just me, but this is small kids young delicate lungs. And a little kid who told them it was bugging her and they ignored it. A kid who I trusted them to look after.

Am I being over dramatic or was this really not ok? Are there some kind of laws about this?

SR21

What would you have them do?

If they can’t stop the smoking in the other side - and I assume they don’t have any legal ability to stop it - then what are they to do?

I hate it too. And as an asthmatic it is an immediate health issue for me. But I don’t think it’s an immediate health issue for most healthy kids for a one off exposure.

I’d be wanting to talk to the authorized supervisor to find out how this will be managed in future.

CallMeAl

SR21 If they can’t stop the smoking in the other side - and I assume they don’t have any legal ability to stop it - then what are they to do?

I wondered that, and I think it would have to look like walking them to a local park or eating inside, unless they can come to some agreement with the neighbours not to smoke outside at that particular time.

Peppermint-Velvet

Is it run by an OOSHC company eg Camp Australia or YMCA? Whoever the company running the holiday program is should have a tobacco policy, I’d be asking to see their policy and questioning it with whoever is the nominated supervisor of the program,

PuddingPlease

It sounds like a really difficult situation for the centre (and also possibly the neighbours) to be honest. There are two different issues that you have raised, the health ramifications and the yuck factor. In terms of health, people smoking on the other side of a fence, outdoors, probably isn’t any worse for a persons health than breathing in fumes from a busy road I suspect and there are plenty of child care centres on busy roads.

If the smell was noticeably unpleasant then I think it’s reasonable to expect that to be managed but, as you observe, it’s entirely possible that the smell was far less noticeable to others. If the centres policies actually prevent them from eating indoors for health reasons (presumably they are required to have tables set up and there isn’t the space or something) then they do have to let the kids eat at some point.

The real issue is that centres that have been set up in residential areas have outdoor spaces next to other peoples homes and are forced to deal with all the inconveniences that this causes. The neighbours are entitled to use their space and if the issue was a smelly BBQ then nobody would think to complain I don’t think. While intuitively it can seem like people should be legally entitled to be free from strong odours caused by others, in practice no such right really exists. We live in a residential suburb near farms and sometimes the smell of fertiliser is strong enough to floor you. Yukky and probably not great for anyones health but also nobodies fault.

If your DD wasn’t comfortable there then I definitely wouldn’t be going back but it’s hard to see what the centre could practically do in that situation. Ideally (and I mean this sincerely) all child care would be provided in pristine locations away from environmental pollutants and with ready access to nature but in many areas that would make it impossible to access at all.

CallMeAl

PuddingPlease In terms of health, people smoking on the other side of a fence, outdoors, probably isn’t any worse for a persons health than breathing in fumes from a busy road I suspect and there are plenty of child care centres on busy roads.

I guess part of the issue is that their ‘fence’ was more like a visual blocker - it was a metal thing with holes through it, that provided a visual barrier rather than a barrier to air. Moreover I think the neighbour was commercial - possibly the RSL - so I suspect it was their smoking area and a number of people were using it, not just the odd resident now and then. So a combination of heavy use and no actual air barrier and it’s pretty close to someone just standing and smoking next to the kids.

So I guess in that vein, at least a proper fence could be erected so that smoke would have to travel over the fence rather than straight across. Secondly I’m guessing they must have a common landlord given the setup, so I wonder if they could take it up with then if sufficiently motivated.

I was reading up and the line for second hand smoke is like the one they use for drinking during pregnancy - there is no safe level of second hand smoke (and that’s not even for kids specifically): https://www.cancer.org.au/cancer-information/causes-and-prevention/workplace-cancer/tobacco

I think I should be able to expect they do something about it.

Camokat

PuddingPlease While intuitively it can seem like people should be legally entitled to be free from strong odours caused by others, in practice no such right really exists.

My BIL used to live in a huge housing complex. There was one resident who went insane whenever anyone cooked onions - he would go knocking on people’s doors to try and find out who was frying them and tell them not to!

catbus

Oh yuck. I absolutely despise being forced to breathe cigarette smoke. I think it is a hazard they should be managing. So I don’t think you’re being unreasonable.

If the neighbours are apartments they’ll probably have strata laws about not allowing cigarette smoke to disturb neighbours or something. If not, then the gym has to arrange. Surely they could have lunch indoors. What happens in a storm, freezing weather or 40C weather? Surely they’d be allowed indoors then!

SR21

CallMeAl that’s definitely a worthwhile suggestion to make to them. Also with the further information about it being an RSL they may be able to get the RSL to assist (I thought it was a private home).

I’d definitely let them know your preferred outcomes, and hopefully since they seem fairly simple solutions they’ll implement them quickly.

catbus

CallMeAl hmm if it’s commercial, then in my experience they (rsl) need to remedy that. I know that at one of our Scout halls, our wharf is next door (like 1.5m away) to the yacht club outdoor area. Our Scout hall argued that Scouts’ parents did not send them to scouts expecting them to be witnessing drinking and drunken behaviour, and demanded they remedy it. They ended up putting screens up along the side next to us. And anytime they fail to pull the screens down (Friday nights with a band- it gets hilariously rowdy!!), I go marching my way past the security guards demanding to see the manager and ask him to put the bloody screens down!!

PuddingPlease

CallMeAl

The reason that there is considered to be no safe level of alcohol in pregnancy or exposure to second-hand smoke is because there is no possible way to ethically discover what it might be, not because the tiniest bit of exposure is ever going to be considered risky.

It doesn’t mean that anyone seriously thinks that a teaspoon full of sherry in a trifle is going to harm an unborn baby, just that proving it is safe would require exposing a group of pregnant women to increasing quantities of alcohol until it caused harm to one of their babies. Or smoking different quantities of cigarettes around children and waiting for one to get very sick. It’s really important to make that distinction in my view to avoid terrifying pregnant women unnecessarily.

I completely agree about the physical barrier though and, knowing that it is the smoking area of an RSL, I agree that it’s worth complaining. It might be possible to close it at certain times or move it to a different area and they should certainly include a proper fence.

Peppermint-Velvet

Camokat I would have been seriously tempted to cook up a big batch and leave it on his doorstep and ‘ding dong ditch’ ala the way people leave flaming bags of dog shit on stupid movies.

NightHawk

Camokat That’s weird and extreme.

CallMeAl

catbus that’s interesting, I hadn’t thought about commercial having a different level of responsibility.

CallMeAl

PuddingPlease It doesn’t mean that anyone seriously thinks that a teaspoon full of sherry in a trifle is going to harm an unborn baby, just that proving it is safe would require exposing a group of pregnant women to increasing quantities of alcohol until it caused harm to one of their babies. Or smoking different quantities of cigarettes around children and waiting for one to get very sick. It’s really important to make that distinction in my view to avoid terrifying pregnant women unnecessarily.

While I agree, the fact is that for pregnant woman it IS used as a way to say “don’t have any”.

And it should be that way for kids too IMO. A kids right to not inhale second hand smoke way overrides an adults right to smoke in an area that impacts others.

Camokat

NightHawk That’s weird and extreme.

Yeah, that dude needed to live in a cave out bush, not in a housing complex.

IcyPole

CMA: I’d be very pissed off about the smoking too. I hate cigarette smoke so much. DD hates the smell too. I expect children in vacation care/OSHC to be protected from passive smoking. There’s a 5 metre buffer zone of no smoking around educational facility boundaries in Queensland. Unfortunately it doesn’t apply to business or residential properties that share a boundary with the educational facility.

https://www.health.qld.gov.au/public-health/topics/atod/tobacco-laws/education

In your case I’d expect the children to eat inside away from the cigarette smoke, even if they have to split the children into two different shifts for eating.

Edited to add two words I forgot.

PuddingPlease

CallMeAl

I actually don’t completely agree.

To use an extreme example, I do not think it is reasonable to demand that an elderly adult with social anxiety and disability should be harassed to stop smoking in their own backyard because they are unlucky enough to live next door to a child care centre.

My view is that the adults right to be comfortable in his own backyard actually trumps everything else. If the childcare centre cannot operate safely on that basis then the onus is on their management to find a solution but I think his rights are paramount because there is just nowhere else that he can be expected to go.

Obviously if the smoke is blowing over from a business then that is different and some sort of compromise should be worked out but I don’t think the rights of children in a commercial centre should automatically override the rights of the person who lives in the house next door.

NightHawk

Can the childcare put up a better barrier their side of the fence?

IcyPole

With strong fans directing the smoke back at the smokers and away from the children.

IcyPole

PuddingPlease That’s when a compromise would be important, like the neighbour doesn’t smoke outside during the outdoor meal breaks. The child care would need to have set times and stick to them, and then the neighbour would be able to avoid smoking at those times. A bit of consideration for each other and hopefully a compromise could be reached.

CallMeAl

PuddingPlease To use an extreme example, I do not think it is reasonable to demand that an elderly adult with social anxiety and disability should be harassed to stop smoking in their own backyard because they are unlucky enough to live next door to a child care centre.

My view is that the adults right to be comfortable in his own backyard actually trumps everything else. If the childcare centre cannot operate safely on that basis then the onus is on their management to find a solution but I think his rights are paramount because there is just nowhere else that he can be expected to go.

I think I come more from the philosophy that no person has the right to do anything in their backyard that affects someone else’s health. Whether it be smoking, grinding up bits of asbestos, burning lead, emitting sound at a decibel level that could damage ears - whatever else I can think of that could conceivably damage someone’s health, is not ok to ‘enjoy’ except in a space where its not impacting someone else. As they say “your right to swing your fist ends where my nose starts” - there is no right on your own property to do things that could potentially damage people outside it.