国会議員だけに特権？　国会図書館、専用の喫煙室廃止へ

National Diet Library to abolish exclusive smoking room

It was found that the National Diet Library in Nagata-Cho, Tokyo, has set up a smoking room exclusively for members of the Diet while saying that smoking is prohibited on the premises on its website. The policy is to abolish it in the future, but experts point out, "Why did only members of the Diet grant privileges? The public's understanding cannot be obtained."

The museum has space where general users can browse publications published in Japan, and there are 18 parliamentary reading rooms and laboratories on the 6th floor where members of the Diet examine materials. Smoking was allowed in 4 of the rooms, but the revised Health Promotion Law was enacted in 2018, and it was decided that smoking will be prohibited in the hall from April 2008, as in the Diet.

In principle, smoking rooms can be set up even if smoking is prohibited, so the museum will discuss how to deal with it. In December 2018, while the smoking rooms used by general users and staff were abolished, two of the four parliamentary reading rooms and laboratories that could smoke were decided to be smoking rooms.

In October 2019, the museum announced on its website that "No smoking will be carried out on the premises from April 2008. There is no place where users (including staff and visitors) can smoke."

The museum, which belongs to the Diet, explained, "Since the Diet left a smoking area, we took the same measures. Since it is not an area that the general public can enter, we have not made it known."

According to the museum, the smoking room exclusively for members of the Diet will spend 4.5 million yen to repair the air conditioning and start operation in November 2019. However, due to the small number of users, the policy is to abolish it on the 13th of next month, which is about one year after the start of the operation.

Professor Ichi Kurosawa and Tohoku University (Industrial Medicine) said, "As long as smoking rooms are installed, passive smoking to cleaners and staff cannot be completely prevented. The library used by many people is originally on the premises. You should quit smoking completely. "

Source: https://www.asahi.com/articles/ASNBQ71QVNBFUTIL040.html