Islington Tribune - News: Diners smoke

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Islington Tribune - by PETER GRUNER
Published: 7 September 2007

Neighbours Linda Davies, Derek Smith and Pauline Stewart

Diners’ smoke gets up neighbours’ noses

Restaurant says car fumes are bigger nuisance

SMOKE from diners eating outside a Finsbury Park restaurant is wafting up into flats above, residents complained on Monday.
They told an Islington Council licensing committee that on warm nights smoke from La Parisienne in Seven Sisters Road came up through air vents into their upstairs flats.
The residents were objecting to an application by the restaurant for a new licence to sell alcohol until 10pm.
Solicitor Linda Davies, who has lived in a flat above La Parisienne for 30 years, told the hearing that the owner had turned the former café into a restaurant which, she maintained, constituted a material change.
She complained about baking smells from 6am and noise and shouting when she got home at night.
Ms Davies said she was forced to breathe in smoke when diners sitting outside lit up cigarettes below her flat.
“Since they banned smoking inside public premises in July, everyone is smoking outside,” she said. “I have certainly been aware of smoke in my flat and the same is true about my neighbours.
“I consider it extremely ironic that a smoking ban designed to protect people in the workplace has the effect of increasing the amount of smoke that I, a non-smoker, am subject to.”
Other residents, including taxi driver Derek Smith and retired clerical worker Pauline Stewart, complained about noise.
Mr Smith said: “This is a residential area but you hear the TV and radio and the noise of people laughing often quite late at night.
“The smoking when people are sitting at tables outside is always an irritant. We get the smoke coming up through our air vents.”
Speaking on behalf of the owner, solicitor Michael White said staff at La Parisienne had done all they could to minimise disturbance to neighbours.
Mr White added: “Sadly for Ms Davies, the area is a lot different and busier to what it was back in 1983. For example, some 300 languages are spoken in the vicinity.
“As for smoke emanating from tables outside, you are far more likely to be breathing in the toxic fumes of cars and lorries than our those of our smokers.”
The committee agreed that alcohol could be served until 10pm but added a number of conditions.
They included the installation of CCTV inside the restaurant. Notices would also ask diners to leave in a quiet and orderly manner.

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