Smoking in public places in Scotland will be banned from spring 2006

Dr Jeffrey Wigand, whose campaigning against the US tobacco industry was depicted in a Hollywood film, launched the report in Edinburgh.

He said the tobacco industry tried to hide smoking risks when arguing against the ban, which begins next Spring.

The Tobacco Manufacturers Association said it argued its case quite openly.

The Insider

Ash Scotland's report, entitled The Unwelcome Guest: How Scotland Invited the Tobacco Industry to Smoke Outside, claims to reveal the background to Scotland's smoking ban.

It claims the move to ban smoking in Scotland is the most radical public health decision taken since devolution.

Dr Wigand, the former vice president for research and development at the tobacco company Brown & Williamson, gave the keynote speech at Ash Scotland's annual general meeting.

In 1995, he fought to reveal his knowledge of the tobacco industry's disregard for the damage cigarettes can cause.

His story was eventually documented in the Hollywood blockbuster The Insider, starring actors Russell Crowe and Al Pacino.

He told the AGM that the tobacco industry did everything it could to avoid a ban and claims the tactics used in Scotland were similar to those employed by the industry to fight second-hand smoke legislation in the US in the 1990s.

Dr Wigand's story became a Hollywood movie

The report claims that the Scottish Licensed Trade Association (SLTA) tried to refute the health evidence on the dangers of second-hand smoke.

Ash Scotland said the pro-smoking lobby attempted to promote ventilation systems as an alternative to a public smoking ban.

The report also claimed that the tobacco industry and hospitality groups predicted economic gloom for Scotland once a smoking ban comes into force.

But it said not one study or survey based on objective data ever reported an economic downturn after a ban was put in place.

It pointed to bars in Ireland and New York which now have higher turnover and sales than they did before they went smoke-free.

The Tobacco Manufacturers' Association said that the relative risks of passive smoking were negligible and that ventilations systems did work.

The TMA also said that there was a downturn in pub trade in Ireland since the ban there, although sales were now picking up.