One of the four Ministers of State who spoke out against the proposed smoking ban has conceded that the "battle is over".
"The ministerial order is going to be signed next week and there isn't a damn thing we can do about it now," Junior Minister for the Marine, Mr John Browne, told The Irish Times. "I just hope it will be implemented in a reasonable manner, and that we won't see individuals and publicans being put in jail over it," he said.
The junior minister and Wexford TD confirmed that he had spoken out against the ban at last week's Fianna Fáil parliamentary party meeting.
"We expressed our views, as did most of the members of the parliamentary party. The ban is not a bad idea, but how it is implemented is going to be the problem. I suggested that it should be phased in, with the introduction of smoking rooms which would then be phased out in two to three years," he said.
The junior minister said that he had met a lot of publicans who said they were going to flout the law, while many others had told him they would do their best to implement the legislation.
"In fairness to the Minister for Health and Children, Mr Martin, he has been doing a good job, and he is genuinely concerned about the impact of smoking on people."
