One Year On From The Smoking Ban..

On July 1st 2007 smoking in pubs was banned. This was accompanied by a massive outcry from trade organisations who claimed that the ban would drive pubs out of business and, rather than causing people to give up smoking would merely lead to people smoking at home. Whilst it is undoubtedly true that many businesses have indeed been badly affected its more difficult to judge how the ban has affected trade within the pubs in the village.

I was not resident in Silverton at the time the ban was imposed but as a fairly regular visitor to the village prior to the ban I cant really see that trade has been seriously harmed. Those who like going out for a drink and for social reasons are still doing so and if smokers seem to have ajusted to the situation where they have to indulge their habit outdoors. This seems even to have held true during the winter when we were warned of the direst consequences for the licensed trade. People adjust here just as they had to in Ireland and Scotland where the ban was introduced earlier. Additionally, people who could not bear smoky atmospheres for health reasons can now go for a drink or a meal without suffering the ill effects. Whether, as some claim the absence of tobacco smoke in the pub atmosphere as allowed other, less pleasent smells to come to the fore is something I cant say that I have noticed. Bar staff on the whole seem to be ever more appreciative of the cleaner air that they now can work in.

I must say though, as an ex smoker and a frequenter of public houses for the past forty years that there is still something missing when you walk into a pub and you cannot smell the once familier aroma of tobacco smoke mixed with the smell of beer. I doubt that those of us whose drinking lives extend back before the ban will ever feel entirely at home without it.