The Irish Republic (home of my people!) is about to institute a major
smoking ban in all public places including... PUBS!
For those in the one town, a puff in the pub means crossing the
border... are there any pubs DIRECTLY on the border? That would be
interesting.

Irish Border Pubs Fear Smokers Will Head North
Sat Mar 27, 2004 04:56 AM ET

By Alex Richardson

BELLEEK, the Irish Border (Reuters) - Signs are going up, the ashtrays
are being sold off, but as Ireland prepares for a pioneering ban on
smoking not everyone at the Jolly Farmers is happy.

"It's going to really hit business -- if a group of six are going out
for the evening, and two of them smoke, they're not going to come to
the Jolly Farmers," said Jackie Doogan, whose father is landlord of
the pub in the border-straddling village of Belleek.

"If people smoke, they tend to want to smoke when they are having a
drink, (Irish Health Minister) Micheal Martin has done us no favors."

The ban, which comes into force on Monday, will apply to virtually all
workplaces and closed public spaces, but in a nation famous for its
watering holes it is the prohibition on smoking in pubs which has
attracted most attention.

Many publicans are nervous about lost trade, but the Jolly Farmers'
position, on the edge of the pretty border village, makes it
particularly vulnerable to disgruntled smokers voting with their feet.

The pub is in County Donegal, in the northwest of the Irish Republic,
and like everywhere else in the country the owners face a fine if they
don't stop customers lighting up.

But most of the village is on the other side of the River Erne in
County Fermanagh, part of British-ruled Northern Ireland, where
smokers will be free to carry on puffing.

"A lot of the people who come in here on a week night would be
smokers," Doogan told Reuters.

"So far a lot of the regulars have just laughed, I don't think they
realize how serious it is, but some people have said if we enforce it
they'll be off over the bridge."

A walk of a few hundred yards from the Jolly Farmers, across the
bridge, brings you to Moohan's Fiddlestone, one of several pubs and
hotels along the village's main street, where landlord John McCann is
understandably more relaxed.

"I think it will be watched closely in the north to see what happens,"
he said. "I'm not sure whether we'll see a lot of people coming over
the border so they can smoke, but there'll be a welcome for them here
if they do."

The government says the move, which will make Ireland the first
country in the world to introduce a nationwide smoking ban, will help
save some of the 7,000 Irish lives lost to smoking-related diseases
each year.

A recent survey by pollsters TNS also helped boost the government's
argument that the ban will prove popular, showing that twice as many
people say they are more likely to visit a smoke-free pub than a pub
where smoking is allowed.

But many who enjoy the current ambience of Ireland's traditional pubs,
where a smoky haze is as common as a foaming pint of Guinness, are yet
to be convinced.

"It's a disgrace, we didn't even get a chance to vote on this," said
musician Naoife Molloy, enjoying an afternoon drink in Nancy's bar, 20
miles northwest of Belleek on Donegal's craggy coast. "I play music
in bars, and when you finish playing you sit down to have your first
pint and you want a cigarette, and the person behind the bar, who you
probably know really well, has got to tell you can't. It's not fair to
both sides."

© Copyright Reuters 2004.