Jump to full article: Channel 4 Television (uk), 2007-06-25
Author: Source: PA News
Intro: Antony Worrall Thompson has said that the impending smoking ban is an "infringement of civil liberties" and that pro-smoking campaigners will "fight on" after the July 1 ban.
Speaking before the Revolt In Style Dinner at the Savoy hotel in London, the television chef and restaurateur insisted that smoking is a sociable activity and that the Irish ban had merely driven people on to the streets.
"If you go to Dublin, everybody is out on the pavement - including the non-smokers," he said, adding that the ban was the "start of a slippery slope".
"Tonight's a celebration, it's not a wake, and we intend to fight on and hope one day that we'll be able to get exemption licences. It's an infringement of civil liberties, really. . . .
Simon Clark, director of pressure group Forest (Freedom Organisation for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco), was telling the event's 400 guests that "we have won the battle but we haven't lost the war".
He said say: "We urge the Government to amend the legislation to allow designated smoking rooms in some pubs and allow private clubs to devise a policy on smoking in accordance with their members' wishes."
Claire Fox, director of the Institute of Ideas, was saying: "It is a sign of our small-minded times when the most exciting new idea to come out of politics is banning smoking.
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