Four days.
It's been only four days since the last 'how very dare they smoke a fag when the sun is out and I decide to enjoy sitting at a wobbly table breathing lorry fumes with my coffee?' thread.
Sorry this is long.
Dear non-smokers who have caught a whiff of an outside fag and are Feeling Outraged,
What you need to realise is that the indoor smoking ban wasn't about you in the first place. Here's what the House of Lords had to say after the smoke-free legislation came in:
Passive Smoking
76. The recently introduced bill to ban smoking in public places illustrates a number of worrying features connected with the formulation and promotion of legislation[49]. The stated objective of the bill was to ban smoking at work and in enclosed public places, because passive smoking imposes a significant health risk on workers and others exposed to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS).
77. In order to evaluate the operation of risk policy in this area, we considered a range of evidence, much of which cast doubt on the stated rationale of the legislation. In her evidence to us, Caroline Flint, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Public Health, commented that:
"it is clearly the case that, in relation to deaths from smoking and second-hand smoke, the most serious aspect of that is smoking in the home. Ninety-five percent of deaths are related to smoking in the home"[50].
Other evidence we received suggested that the health risks associated with passive smoking are relatively minor and the main harm, if there is one, concerns children who are exposed to passive smoking in the home, which is something the bill is not designed to address[51]. Sir Richard Peto did suggest that ex-smokers might be more at risk from ETS than those who had never smoked at all, but the general tenor of his evidence indicated that the risks are uncertain and unlikely to be large[52].
78. Given the evidence about the impact of passive smoking, we are concerned that the decision to ban smoking in public places may represent a disproportionate response to a relatively minor health concern. It may be that the unstated objective of policy is to encourage a reduction in active smoking by indirect means. This may well be a desirable policy objective, but if it is the objective, it should have been clearly stated.
If evidence for the risk of harm from indoor second-hand smoke is weak and tenuous, how much evidence of harm do you think there is for outdoor second-hand smoke? That's right, there's fuck all!
So, you can't justify a ban* on smoking in outdoor settings on the grounds of your health.
You could argue that a ban would encourage more smokers to quit. That's a noble aim - after all, smoking kills half of all regular smokers, ~100,000 deaths per year in the UK. Banning smokers from smoking in yet more places for their own good would certainly improve their physical health if it prompted them to quit. There are two problems with this -
- It doesn't help. It has helped, up to a point. The 'denormalisation' strategy - basically encouraging the general public to treat smokers like shit on their shoe - has nudged lots of people to quit smoking. There was a sharp drop in smoking rates after 2007 but then things kind of plateaued at around 20% until last year. The recent momentous drop to below 20% is more to do with ecigs than denormalisation.
The smokers who are left are on average more heavily addicted, much poorer and massively more likely to have a MH diagnosis. No amount of taxing them, shunning them, making them look at pictures of diseases every time they pick their packet up, or just casually telling them they are selfish, stupid and smelly at every opportunity, is going to work. The average smoker already feels shit. Making people feel more shit about themselves is not generally recognised as a good way to get them to care about their health. There are interesting discussions within public health on the ethics and efficacy of stigma and shame.
- It's dishonest. If you are going to ban people from doing things for their own good and for no other reason, you should consult them first, otherwise where do we stop? Sugar does no good to anybody and lots of harm in excess so let's just ban it. Alcohol may have some small health benefits in very small doses but most people who drink have at least a bit more than is good for them, maybe we should introduce bans on buying more than one unit?
So you're left with wanting to ban something because it's a bit annoying to you. I have quite a list of those things 
If you want a smoke-free environment to eat your dinner outside then tell the business. They care about customer feedback because they want customers so they might decide it's in their interests. Some of their customers might be smokers though who have their own opinions about relaxing with a coffee and a fag in the sunshine.
*I'm assuming everybody is happy that they live in a country where everything is allowed until it is banned rather than the other way around, otherwise there would be nothing new ever and we'd all still be in caves (if they'd been permitted).