Les Doherty said that local publicans were at different levels of preparedness for the ban, which comes into force on Monday. He also warned that some publicans may be forced out of business because of the new legislation.

"The delay in processing planning applications can be anything up to 18 or 24 months but that is not the fault of publicans and they should not be punished because of it.

That is why we are calling for the Planning Service to show a bit of leniency when it comes to applications for licensed premises. Nicola Carruthers wrote an article in the latest issue of The Publican newsletter and she will be coming got Derry to speak to the planners about this," he said.

Mr. Doherty also said that many publicans are not prepared for the introduction of the legislation. "Some are ready for it and some are not. We all knew that this was coming so some people will say that we should be ready but the fact is that the exact criteria for the legislation was only finalised quite recently. No-one wanted to start the work to get their premises ready without knowing exactly what was required of them and now they will be facing difficulties," he said.

Mr.Doherty, the owner of the Bound For Boston Bar, said that he made the decision five years ago to provide outside facilities for smokers. "We started looking into this matter about five years ago and we made the decision that, in order to provide a duty of care for the employees, we would build an outdoor decked area that smokers could use.

We did not ban smoking in the bar but by building a fully licensed and fully insured outdoor area it gave smokers the alternative," he said.
Mr. Doherty also said that he expected some publicans to go out of business but predicted that bars would stay open.

He added that publicans have "mixed views" about the introduction of the new legislation. "This will have a profound effect on all publicans but that effect will vary depending on how prepared publicans are. Those publican who are not ready will see their profits adversely affected while others who got in ahead of the game and introduced steps ahead of the legislation could see an increase in their revenue."