being honest i think more and more people are homebrewing these days because of the price of beer in pubs. i paid £4.15 for a pint of localally brewed ale the other night...for an extra £6 i could have brewed 40 pints. the smoking ban hasn't helped but the government are killing the pub/brewing industry. where's all the people who don't smoke who were staying away from pubs because of the people who smoked in them?? they're staying away because of the beer prices. i don't smoke myself but they should have parts of a pub where you can smoke, with extractor fans and not being made to go outside in the snow for a fag...a pub is to socialise. its not very sociable when your mates and your wife are getting up for a fag every half hour and leaving you to watch there handbag...cut the tax on beer and have INDOOR smoking area's & watch the people come flooding in. :drink: