Less support for smoking ban in pubs than in restaurants

When it comes to legally stopping smoking in public places there is less customer support for a ban in pubs than in areas such as restaurants.

In a survey conducted by the Office for National Statistics, although 93 per cent of those polled supported the ban in restaurants a lesser figure of 75 per cent agreed with the ban in pubs.

New legislation was introduced making enclosed public places smoke-free in England from July 2007, although the ban had been enforced in Scotland in March 2006 and April 2007 in Wales.

In terms of smoking restrictions in other public places the figures supporting a ban were:

85 per cent in the workplace
94 per cent in indoor sports and leisure centres
91 per cent in indoor shopping centres
85 per cent in railway and bus stations.

A significantly lower figure of 67 per cent of smokers in 2008/09 were willing to give up compared with 74 per cent wishing to abandon tobacco in 2007, according to the survey into smoking related behaviour and attitudes, Opinions Survey Report No. 40, which covered the period September 2008 to March 2009.

Other statistics in the report include:

Nearly a third of smokers (31 per cent) said they wanted to give up because they could not afford to smoke or considered smoking a waste of money

69 per cent said smoking was not allowed in their home, compared with 61 per cent in 2006

50 per cent of smokers claimed they intended to quit the habit within the next 12 months

Over 80 per cent of the people surveyed thought that secondhand smoking could increase a non-smoking adult's risk of lung cancer, bronchitis and asthma.

The survey also revealed 44 per cent of those when asked put smoking as the prime cause of premature death before the age of 65 although others went for road accidents as a similar mortality cause not appreciating that fewer than 3,000 people under the age of 69 die in road accidents compared with 33,000 deaths of people under the age of 65 from smoking.

Smokers showed an apparent awareness of the dangers of smoke to children with 77 per cent claiming they did not smoke at all when they were in a room with a child. This behaviour has increased over the years from the 54 per cent recorded in 1997.

Current smokers jibed at the amount of taxation on tobacco with only 17 per cent saying that tax should be increased by more than the rate of inflation. In direct contrast 64 per cent of those who had never smoked supported inflation-plus rises on tobacco taxation.