"scared"

So your saying the many have had to give up pleasure for the few.Everyone has to stop smoking because you wanted to go to the pub.I don't smoke,I used to,but will not stop other people from doing it even in my home.How long before peanuts are banned because of nut allergys.The minority rule the majority,well thats labour innit.

You're missing the point here, Mr Anonymous. Leg_Iron was talking about freedom.

I truly sympathise with your asthma problem, but the establishments you are talking about are run by people who have invested huge sums of money. Many are traders who own their own land. They should have the first choice as to what happens on their property. Smoking is a legal activity, so they should not be told who they should favour in what is, effectively, a war between differing nicotine providers.

It should be your choice whether you wish to frequent such places, but your choice should not trump the owner's right to dictate what happens on his property.

If enough of you stayed away, they would be mad not to accommodate you. The simple fact is that this was not happening. There was little demand for non-smoking pubs.

Therefore, as stated by the previous commenter, the smoking ban was a triumph of the monority over the majority. It also trampled all over the idea of property rights.

Oh yeah ... it has also destroyed over 5,000 businesses, cost tens of thousands of jobs, and led directly to a few deaths too. Real deaths, not those made up ones the anti-smokers like to lie about.

Would not the Labour manifesto commitment (hahahaha) of banning smoking in establishments that serve food, been a much more sensible option? Especially as that was what they were voted in on?

It's a bollocks law that cannot be defended unless one agrees with a dictatorial, authoritan state.

Leg_Iron, as usual, is spot on. While the smoking ban remains with no exemptions, the idea of freedom in this country is a sham.

If I visit a non-smoker's house, I'll go outside to smoke. That, to me, is only fair. They don't want smoke in their house.

If a non-smoker visits me, they can go outside while I smoke if they want. If they have asthma or other breathing problems, then obviously I'd make allowances for that. If they came through the front door then I must have invited them (unless it's one of these officials who claim power of entry in which case the smoking rate will double) and I'd know if smoking was going to be a problem.

Likewise, we could easily have had smoking and non-smoking pubs. I know of one pub where few of the customers were smokers. I know of at least twelve that are now either mostly empty or closed because most of the customers were smokers. We could have had the choice.

Now, even if I were to set up a private smoker's club for smokers only, we'd all have to stand outside to smoke. Including the staff (who would all be smokers). I'd have discrimination lawsuits because I wouldn't employ non-smokers and then the council would be round beause someone dropped a cigarette butt outside. Non-smokers would demand to be allowed membership on the grounds of equality and would then complain about people coming back inside smelling of smoke, and about having to pass smokers at the door on the way in.

That's why smokers are angry. We'd be fine with non-smoking pubs, we'd either go outside or we wouldn't go there at all. The fact is, we can't even set up private clubs and smoke indoors because of this law. Now we are blamed for all the litter in the streets too.

Any smoker voting Labour at the next election needs his head examined. If the Cameroids had any sense, they'd be talking about relaxing this law and allowing each premises the choice. Some will choose to stay non-smoking, but some won't, and that's all the smokers really want. Unlike the rabid anti-smokers out there, we don't want it all.

True. I sit corrected. I would stand corrected but I've been drinking.

I have assumed the position. Bare hands only please, no spiked paddles this time.

I don't know much about asthma - is it a response to irritants in the atmosphere, much like hay fever, or is it a psychological-reaction sort of thing?

I used to drink with a guy who had asthma, before he was promoted to Wales (yes, it's that bad here), and he never seemed to have any trouble in the old smoky pubs. I'd avoid smoking around him but I don't know if that did any good.

He had a lot of trouble with hills, which means he must really hate his current location.