from july 1, england falls in line with the rest of uk and bans

Personally, I don't smoke, but certainly used to and the old pubs were a great place to sit clouds of the stuff and chat. I particularly like chatting to the friend old codgers who used to tell us teenagers (of drinking age of course ;-)) of the way life used to be. How there used to stables behind the pub, when the gents now stands and how they used to riding home drunk, often falling of their horses. We were also taught how to mull ale, with a red hot poker from a roaring coal fire. Those were great, if not legless days.. Now... Do we have to be mamby-pambied by Europe? Even as someone who will avoid smokey atmospheres (a reformed smoker is worse), I think these places should continue to exist. Also I hear the Constitution has changed its name to Treaty and is going to be thrust on us anyway... Are things going to get worse? I don't know but there has been such a slow subtle change eroding away at our freedom to do as we want (within reason)that I think there will be more controls to come... :-)

I know that my friends and I dont frequent any nice places anymore, we even have a couple of English pubs here. Most of the owners are losing money and some even going out of business. We either stay at home, house parties or find some restaurant/bar with an outdoor terrace where we can still smoke.

Smoking in bars, pubs and restaurants has been banned here in NZ for quite some time now. Some pubs started gardens where people could go outside and smoke while they had a few drinks and a chat. Most pubs and restaurants still noticed a marked downfall in business though, and some even had to close vecause of a lack of business. It was a shame really, as it seemed it was the smaller more friendly places that suffered the most. From memory the places that survived lost in excess of 30% of their business because of the new laws. What surprises me is why the civil rights peple didn't make more of a fuss saying the government was taking away a persons rights to smoke when they wanted and if they wanted.

Where I am from in th USA we have had this smoking ban for years in public places. They can not ban smoking in private clubs Such as the VFW bar (veterans of foreign wars) So needless to say when I want to go to a pub and drink I go the the VFW. My Dad was a veteran so being as I am his child I am able to go to those private VFW clubs.

That's terrible....part of the whole "mystique" of the typical English pub is the smokey atmosphere that always gave it "character"--nope never been to England so never to a pub...but have seen it in scores of movies...They have that here in America too...so people going to bars/pubs have to go outside to smoke

The state of Illinois is doing the same thing. I'm not sure why they want to in the first place. The state taxes encrued from smokers has been the states bread and butter..with so many quitters..because of prices and bans..I don't see how the states are justifing their actions..aren't they in essence cutting their own financial throats?

It's going to upset a lot of people, it will make a difference to pubs and clubs, a lot of people will stay at home rather than go out and I can't see it having that much affect on people giving up smoking to be honest. Personally I think it's too heavy handed. The government should worry more about drinking than smoking. It's drinking that causes the problems in this country, are they going to do anything about that? Pretty soon we'll be charged for breathing!

It's the same over here in Melbourne. Come July the first, we'll have to freeze our behinds off to have a smoke and actually network. I think smoking time has become the new water cooler talk time.