At 6am on Sunday 1 July 2007 virtually all enclosed public places and workplaces in England will become smoke free by law. I already have a list of all the pubs I want to visit on the first day - perhaps I might even go nightclubbing to ‘bring in' the ban!

But, as socialists, should we be applauding such state interference in our lives? John Reid famously said, "I just do not think the worst problem on our sink estates by any means is smoking, but it is an obsession of the learned middle class... what enjoyment does a 21-year-old single mother of three living in a council sink estate get? The only enjoyment sometimes they have is to have a cigarette." By supporting a smoking ban are we no better than the New Labour leadership who constantly patronise and blame working class people for the ills of capitalist society? Or should we go further and follow the lead of Bhutan, where the sale and use of tobacco is completely outlawed?

In the UK, smoking kills around 114,000 people each year - including about 42,800 from smoking-related cancers, 30,600 from cardiovascular disease and 29,100 who die slowly from emphysema and other chronic lung diseases. Of these 300 people who die every day from smoking, many are comparatively young smokers. Staggeringly, the number of people under the age of 70 who die from smoking-related diseases exceeds the figure for deaths caused by breast cancer, AIDS, traffic accidents and drug addiction put together.

Research has shown that each cigarette shortens a smoker's life by around 11 minutes. Add this to the fact that although life expectancy in the UK has increased, working class people on average die younger. For example, if you live in Glasgow you can expect to live 10 years less than if you lived in Kensington and Chelsea. Shouldn't we be at the forefront of ensuring that working people live long and healthy lives?

One argument against a smoking ban is that it goes against an individual's personal freedom because everyone should have the right to do what they like with their life. However, there are two problems with this. Firstly, we live in a capitalist society where big business dictates what we as individuals can and cannot do. So, in reality, we have only limited personal freedoms. Does this mean, therefore, that under a socialist society everyone would be free to smoke whatever they want, wherever they want? Perhaps not. This takes me to the second point - under both capitalism and socialism we don't live alone. Most of us live and work amongst other people; friends, family, fellow workers and fellow students. Our lives are inextricably intertwined with the lives of others. Smoking in public places exposes us to poisonous fumes. Cigarettes contain more than 4000 chemical compounds and at least 400 toxic substances. The USA Environmental Protection Agency has classified environmental tobacco smoke as a class A carcinogen along with asbestos, arsenic, benzene and radon gas.

It is now considered that the passive smoke (‘side-stream') that comes off a cigarette between puffs carries a higher risk than directly inhaled smoke. Passive smokers suffer an increased risk of a range of smoking-related diseases. At work, exposure to second hand smoke is estimated to cause the death of more than 600 workers a year, including 54 deaths a year in the hospitality industry. This equates to about 1/5 of all deaths from second hand smoke in the general population and up to ½ of all deaths in the hospitality trades.

Domestic exposure to second hand smoke in the UK causes around 10,700 deaths a year. Non-smokers who are exposed to passive smoking in the home have a 25% increased risk of heart disease and lung cancer. Children who grow up in a home where one or both parents smoke have twice the risk of getting asthma, asthmatic bronchitis and allergies. More than 17,000 children under the age of five are admitted to hospital every year because of the effects of passive smoking. Surely we should be protecting workers and children from these damaging effects?