Ban Impacts

Smoking bans represent a major change and challenge for outlets that rely on smokers for much of their business. The effect is, however, much more complex than the ‘everyone wins’ and ‘everyone loses’ arguments put forward in the news media and elsewhere.

National 'blanket' smoking bans are now in force throughout the UK. The Republic of Ireland provides some useful information having gone smoke free in March 2004. Ireland is interesting in that the country is relatively geographically isolated, similar to (but not the same as) the United Kingdom in terms of pub culture, and is well-supplied with official data. Lessons learned in Ireland have also been applied to Scotland, although here the data is less clear as Scottish information is often only collected as part of 'British' or 'United Kingdom' information.

We have examined the following areas:

• Phasing – what happens, when?
• Business Impacts – what happens to whom?
• Health Impacts – has the ban been effective?
• Conclusions for the UK Licensed Trade – what lessons can be learned?