I'd like to add my agreement to all those people, particularly asthmatics, who are fed up with avoiding smoky atmospheres. I'm asthmatic too and I've had to stop going to some sessions, including - annoyingly - my only local one. Some smokers seem oblivious to the fact that they are currently depriving many of the rest of us of a normal social life. As McGrath points out, they can always get their nicotine fix in some other way, if it's impossible to beat the craving. It's their choice. But they don't have a 'right' to fill everyone else's airways with noxious and deadly chemicals. Arguments stating that there weren't any employment rights in the good old days - and that was somehow OK - just leave me horrified and baffled. I used to smoke myself, but I never would have argued that it was my 'right' to inflict it on other people - I was just blithely ignorant of the harm and unpleasantness I was causing, like most smokers are until they give up.
I'm delighted by the ban. There will no doubt be angry negotiations and it's not going to transform things overnight - but it at least shows that there is a cultural change underway. Thank God...