Readers of the Sunderland Echo have voted overwhelmingly to make the city’s biggest shopping centre a no-smoking zone.

The newspaper organised the poll on whether to allow smoking in The Bridges after highlighting the dangers of passive smoking.

The company that runs the shopping centre said they would abide by the final verdict.

And the result of the poll was emphatic with 80 per cent of readers backing a ban.

Bridges manager Phillip Steele said: “It doesn’t come as a surprise. I’m very pleased that the majority of readers wanted to see a smoking ban.

“I can’t give a time frame yet. When we do it, we want to do it properly.”

But smokers rights group Forest have hit out at the plan and appealed with The Bridges management to consider the feelings of the third of shoppers who smoke.

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