The Act – Overview Part 1 – Tobacco, Nicotine Vapour Products and Smoking Chapter 3 – Smoking Outside Hospitals Section 4B: Offence of smoking outside hospital building
66.Subsection (1) makes it an offence for a person to smoke within the no-smoking area outside a hospital building.
67.Subsection (2) provides that it is a defence if the accused can prove that the accused did not know, and could not reasonably be expected to have known, that the area in which the accused was smoking was a no-smoking area. This might arise in instances where, for example, no-smoking signs had been removed or had failed to be displayed. The onus is, however, on the accused to prove this.
68.Subsection (3) provides that a person who commits the offence of smoking in a no-smoking area is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale (currently £1,000).