About Us

Click here to see the Annual Report 2005/06

To see the Annual report for 2007/08, contact the Fresh office

The North-East has the highest smoking rates in the country, killing around 5,500 people every year.

Tobacco remains the single biggest cause of preventable death and disease in the region and addressing this is vital if there is to be any reduction in smoking-related disease and health inequalities.

Fresh Smoke Free North East - a dedicated tobacco control office, was set up in May 2005 following negotiations between key partners including the Association of North East Councils, the Regional Assembly, the Public Health Group North East, Primary Care Trusts and both Strategic Health Authorities. It was agreed that a Regional Tobacco Strategy is needed, delivered by a coalition of organisations and partners under the umbrella term of Fresh.

Based on international best practice, it has led the way in ensuring that workers in the North East received the protection they deserved from secondhand smoke, and we now have the highest compliance rates in the country to the smokefree law.

But smokefree legislation is not the end of the road. We are now undertaking a whole range of initiatives to help the 70% of smokers who want to stop, prevent children and young people from starting to smoke in the first place, and protecting others from secondhand smoke exposure.  Addressing tobacco is also a key element to our regional health and wellbeing strategy ‘Better Health Fairer Health’ which aims to make the North East region the healthiest in the country by 2025.

The office works very closely with the Smoke Free North East Regional Network and the various local tobacco networks. The Fresh Smoke Free North East Office is funded by the Primary Care Trusts in the region and by Public Health Group North East. The North East approach has now been used as the foundation for dedicated regional offices for tobacco control in the North West and South West of England.

Aims and objectives

Monitoring and reporting

The work of the Fresh Office and also delivery of tobacco control across the NHS, local government and partner agencies is now overseen by a Tobacco Regional Advisory Group (RAG) which met for the first time in October 2008.  This replaced the Smoke Free North East Advisory Panel which had been in place for three years.  This RAG is one of ten and feeds directly into the new North East Public Health Board.