More than 100,000 people have signed a petition against the right-wing government's plan for looser smoking restrictions, surpassing a threshold that will bring the matter before parliament, the initiators said on Sunday.
The cabinet that includes the far-right Freedom Party (FPOe) has decided to overturn a previously adopted general tobacco ban for restaurants and bars that was set to come into force in May.
The government's new plan has caused an outcry among doctors, unions and the general public in Austria, where 24 per cent of adults smoke, one of the highest rates among industrialized countries.
On Thursday, the Vienna Medical Association and a cancer aid organization started collecting signatures for their petition to implement the previously agreed ban, instead of allowing smoking sections in restaurants.
Within less than 72 hours, the initiative surpassed the 100,000 signatures that are necessary to force parliament to take up the matter.
‘We will continue to gather support and to collect signatures to raise the pressure step by step,’ said Thomas Szekeres, who heads Vienna's and Austria's medical associations.
Although the petitioners cannot force parliament's final decision, the populist FPOe, which pushed for looser smoking regulations, has started to take notice.
‘Be assured that the FPOe will always lean on the opinion of the people,’ the party's health policy chief Dagmar Belakowitsch told public broadcaster ORF. ‘No scenario must be ruled out,’ she added.
