Bradford artist David Hockney has warned the smoking ban will fuel the use of anti-depressants and increase isolation.

He accused politicians of sneaking through the ban - never mentioned at the last General Election - and treating people who choose to smoke like children.

Last year MPs voted by a huge majority to ban smoking from all pubs and private members' clubs in England from 6am on Sunday. Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt said the change would "save thousands of people's lives".

But writing in Parliament's House magazine Mr Hockney called the ban a "terrible loss of faith in parliamentary democracy" and said it was utterly ridiculous to tell 12 million people they cannot smoke socially despite smoking being legal.

He said: "The current obsession with the body and health is very shallow. I was amused to see an old Wesleyan Chapel at Stamford Bridge in Yorkshire that is now a skin care centre. From the soul to the wrinkled skin - sums it all up.

"What will happen now is people will drink at home. Slowly pubs will close, as has happened in Ireland and Scotland. New public houses' will spring up unofficially in people's living rooms and kitchens and the relentless push of the pharmaceutical industry will supply people with alternative' - anti-depressants and painkillers."

The artist fears the ban will lead to a lot of "unhappy and lonely people."

The vociferous opponent of anti-smoking laws was made a freeman of the city of Bradford in 2000 and was presented with a pair of commemorative ashtrays in a nod to his love of tobacco.