Parliament on Thursday approved long-awaited legislation regulating smoking in public spaces. The law should come into force on January 1, 2008.

The groundbreaking legislation follows two botched attempts at outlawing smoking in public spaces the past three years.

The new legislation sees maximum fines to be imposed on transgressing smokers cut from €1,000 to €750. The minimum fine is €50.

As opposed to earlier law decree proposals, the owners of restaurants, bars and cafés under 100 square metres will be able to choose whether or not they allow smoking on their premises, so long as they can safeguard the air quality of non-smokers.

Venues above 100 square metres will be non-smoking, though they will be able to request licensing to have up to 30 percent of the total floor area destined for smokers.

Smoking in offices will also be prohibited, though companies are permitted to create smoking rooms.

Smoking at state buildings, such as hospitals and schools is also banned, including in open air on the grounds, though universities have been given a slight exemption in terms of this new specific law, allowing ‘stressed’ students to alleviate their addiction on university premises.

On all other government property, smokers will be required to vacate the grounds in order to light up, the new law adds.

Besides the venues that will require special licensing that promises to present extensive bureaucratic obstacles to applicants, smokers will be allowed to light up at smoking rooms in prison, some hotels and care homes, including psychiatric wards and treatment centres for alcoholics.

Smokers will also be able to feed their habit in open air and at home, irrespective of who lives with them including children or asthma sufferers.

The government explains the law has two primary objectives: the protection of non-smokers, estimated at 70 percent of the Portuguese population, and the defence of the "most vulnerable" sectors, children and teenagers.

While previous glitches in passing anti-tobacco legislation were blamed on the government’s concern of a backlash from the tobacco lobby and other interest groups, an increasingly health-conscious society and dropping numbers of smokers seem to be adequate arguments this time round for it to outlaw smoking in public spaces.

But bar owners have laughed off what they term to be the government’s double-standards, saying that while 16-year olds can serve prison terms and consume liquor, they will be breaking the law by smoking before they reach 18.

Figures recently published by the anti-tobacco association say that more than 12,000 people die each year in Portugal as a direct result of smoking, of these, 2,500 were people who had never smoked in their lives but who lived with smokers.

Figures released last week indicate that treating illnesses directly related to smoking cost the Portuguese taxpayer 434 million euros in 2005.

The findings of a survey released last week show that Portugal has the largest number of non-smokers per capita of population than any other European Union member state.

According to the Eurobarometer survey, 64 per cent of Portuguese citizens have never smoked compared to the EU average of 47 per cent.