Revealed: the exact number of Sunderland pubs closed by the 2007 smoking ban

I can't claim to be particularly animated by either, but the smoking issue has opened up old wounds.

The Government might ban smoking in beer gardens, but who is bothered either way? Who has been passionately agitating for this?

However, if a ban does come in I will have as much sympathy for smokers as they did for the rest of us when they were blowing poison into our faces indoors, then saying "you don't have to come here" and "well just wash the smell out of your clothes."

When smoking was banned inside pubs and restaurants in 2007, it was a pity.

A pity that legislation had to attend to something which ought to have been resolved by common courtesy.

Now, the same people who 17 years ago were equating being asked to stand outside to smoke a fag with the worst excesses of Putin's Russia, are at it again, driveling on nonsensically about the police ignoring riots because someone has lit up in a beer garden.

Nor will it be the "death knell of pubs". We've heard that flimsy "argument" before.

The year 2007 also saw the credit crunch which affected virtually every business in every industry on the planet. Money became tight everywhere, but we were assured that pub closures were solely attributable to the smoking ban.

The true number of pubs closed because of the ban stands at precisely zero. The global economy was the real reason alongside, whisper it, the bars that died being unpopular because they were a bit rubbish.

Be honest, how many truly great pubs that were open before 2007 are closed now?

Here's another question. If the smoking ban was repealed, what do you think it would do for the industry?

Most pub-goers like it smokeless and are accustomed to it now, but they'd stay at home if we returned to the stinking establishments they used to put up with.

So ban smoking in pub gardens, or don't. It’s not a huge issue. Just don't recycle the "it closed pubs" whopper of 17 years ago.