Campaign calls for amendments to smoking ban

A new campaign is calling for amendments to the smoking ban to help struggling pubs and clubs.

Launched yesterday, Save Our Pubs & Clubs (SOPAC) wants the public smoking ban curtailed when it is reviewed in 2010, to allow licensees the choice of letting customers smoke on their premises.

The campaign, which is backed by pro-smoking group Forest, as well as free-choice think tanks and MPs from the three main UK parties, argues that the ban has had a disastrous affect on pubs and clubs.

Anthony Worrall Thompson, a patron of Forest, said: "The smoking ban has had an extraordinarily detrimental effect on pubs and clubs and you can understand why. They used to be bastions of adult entertainment where young and old could meet and chat over a pint.

"Modern ventilation systems combined with separate rooms make it perfectly acceptable to smoke indoors. The legislation as it stands is excessive and I would like to see it amended."

Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming said that separate smoking rooms would be better for non-smokers "as they would not have to go through a gauntlet of smokers when going to a pub, which is an unintended consequence of the ban".

However, Mark Hastings from the British Beer and Pub Association said that the industry had "moved on".

"We always said the smoking ban would hit many pubs hard," he told More Than Business News. "However, the industry has been experiencing a 'perfect storm', with many other factors making for tough trading conditions.

"With such a big majority in Parliament in favour of a ban, reversing it is not realistic."