The nationwide smoking ban has triggered the biggest fall in smoking ever seen in England, a report says today. More than two billion fewer cigarettes were smoked and 400,000 people quit the habit since the ban was introduced a year ago, which researchers say will prevent 40,000 deaths over the next 10 years. Smoking was outlawed in all enclosed public spaces in England, including pubs and restaurants on 1 July 2007 after a prolonged political battle that split the Government and inflamed critics of Britain as a nanny state. But longer term opposition to the ban never materialised: more than three out of four people support the law, and compliance has been virtually 100 per cent. Similar bans were introduced in Scotland on 26 March 2006 and in Wales on 2 April 2007. Doctors said they were astonished by the numbers quitting. n The Independent