Smokers in Ontario will soon have to butt out in more places — including bar and restaurant patios, playgrounds, sports fields and ice rinks — or face fines of $250.

The bans announced Friday take effect January 1 and bring an end to what Associate Health Minister Dipika Damerla called a “patchwork” of municipal regulations across the province. The changes also bar sales of tobacco on college and university campuses.

The timing gives restaurants, bars and their patrons time to get used to the restrictions before the outdoor dining and drinking season resumes in the spring.

“It makes sense to do it now,” Damerla said of the ban the Liberals refused to implement during their minority government years.

Opposition health critics applauded the measures but questioned when the government will bring in legislation banning flavoured tobaccos aimed at youth and clamp down on cheap contraband cigarettes.

“It’s not a helpful situation when young people can buy 200 contraband cigarettes in a baggie for $8,” said Progressive Conservative MPP Christine Elliott (Whitby-Oshawa).

“The main reason youth take up smoking is flavoured tobacco,” New Democrat MPP France Gelinas (Nickel Belt) told the Star, urging Health Minister Eric Hoskins to speed up his investigation of e-cigarettes and restrict their use as well.

The restaurant industry said it has been prepared for the patio ban, which Damerla insisted would not hurt business.

“We realized society is going this way . . . we’ll deal with it,” said spokesman James Rilette of Restaurants Canada.

“We think it can work as long as they don’t get too heavy-handed in the early days,” he added, referring to tickets that municipal inspectors who enforce the Smoke-Free Ontario Act could hand out to lawbreakers.

Inspectors have the discretion to issue warnings.

The new measures will also ban smoking on playgrounds, public sports fields and similar surfaces such as ice rinks and it will be illegal to smoke within 20 metres of them to keep children and athletes clear of second-hand smoke.

There’s no such luck for patio diners, who will not enjoy a similar 20-metre exclusion zone. Nor will the province ban smoking in local parks as some municipalities have done.

“One step at a time,” said Damerla.

Michael Perley of the Ontario Campaign for Action on Tobacco credited the government for Friday’s announcement but said he’s pushing for bans on smoking outside entrances to all public buildings, more restricted retail sales, plain packaging and improved access to smoking cessation programs so that smokers who fail don’t fall through the cracks.

The patio ban will reduce exposure to second-hand smoke for servers and patrons given that smoking has still been allowed on patios that are not covered.

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It will also help convince children not to pick up the habit.

“When young people see people smoking on a patio . . . that sends a message that smoking is not all that bad,” Perley said.

The government says tobacco kills 13,000 Ontarians a year and costs $2.2 billion annually in direct health care costs.

Tougher restrictions on tobacco have helped lower Ontario’s smoking rate to 18.1 per cent from 24.5 per cent in 2000.