With a stroke of his pen the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue yesterday consigned to history the dash to the bar at 11.30 p.m. which has been such an integral part of Irish pub culture.

Tonight, for the first Friday in living memory, every pub in Ireland will be able to serve drink until 12.30 a.m. as a result of the coming into effect of the Intoxicating Liquor Act 2000. The new law updates 55 different statutes, some of which date back to 1655, although most came into effect in 1902.

Some pubs availed immediately of the more relaxed drinking hours and opened late last night. The Licensed Vintners' Association and the Irish Vintners' Federation predict that, by tonight, the vast majority of pubs will be staying open until 12.30 a.m., with another 30 minutes of drinking up time.

"We have been asking for this for years so we are ready to take advantage of it immediately," said Mr Richard Dunne, the president of the vintners' federation and a publican himself in Stradbally, Co Laois.

Mr Frank Fell, the chief executive of the Dublin-based Licensed Vintners' Association predicts his members will also be quick to take advantage of the changes.

A deal with the bar workers' trade union last month cleared the way to later opening, he said. Members of Mandate are to get a 26 per cent pay rise with effect from yesterday for working the later hours.

The main changes that came into effect yesterday were the abolition of the distinction between summer and winter trading hours. From now on pubs will close at 11.30 p.m. - with 30 minutes drinking up time - on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday all year round. On Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, closing times will be extended to 12.30 a.m. plus 30 minutes drinking up time.

On Sundays, the closing time will remain 11 p.m., except in advance of bank holidays when it will be midnight. The "holy hour" from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Sundays, also disappears.

Nightclubs will be able to sell alcohol until 2.30 a.m. with an extra 30 minutes allowed for customers to finish their drinks.

The new regulations reflect changes in Irish drinking habits over the past decade and are long overdue, say publicans.

"Our customers drinking patterns have changed a lot. They have started coming out much later and it is madness that we had to ask them to leave just as they are starting to enjoy themselves," explains Mr Dunne.

The drinking public will no doubt welcome the measures and the Government's immediate political objectives will have been met. It could be several more years before it will become clear if the longer-term objectives of the changes in the licensing laws have been met.

A number of other new measures that came into force yesterday have been introduced with the aim of reducing the barriers to entry into the industry. The intention is to increase the number of pubs in urban areas and hopefully bring down the price of drink.

The whole State is to become a single licensing area and restrictions on the movement of licences will be abolished. As and from yesterday, a new licence can be issued anywhere in the state in substitution for existing licence as long as the Circuit Court is satisfied as to the fitness of the applicant and the proposed premises.

Previously, if you wanted to open a new pub you had to buy and extinguish two "rural" licences or one town/city licence to get a licence. There were also restrictions on how close to an existing public house a new one could be opened.

Established pub operators in urban areas have the most to lose under the changes and not surprisingly the Licensed Vintners Association is sceptical about their effectiveness and the prospect that they will bring down prices. "Central Dublin is over supplied with pubs and the new law requires you to prove that there is an inadequate number of licensed premises in the area where you want to open a new one," points out Mr Fell.

To prove his point Mr Fell repeats an oft quoted statistic. "There are 700 pubs in Dublin, which has a population of 1.2 million, while in Cork there are 300 pubs for a population of 200,000," he says. Drink costs much the same in both cities, he says.

"Prices could actually go up as more pubs open," predicts Mr Fell.

Mr Fell is equally pessimistic about the prospect of the new measures increasing the number of pubs in the suburbs, many of which are under served in pub terms. Objections by local residents will effectively block the opening of many new pubs, he says.

Mr Fell's logic appears persuasive but ignores the co-ordinated way in which the members of both associations tend to set their prices.

The possibility that publicans operate as a cartel has been investigated by the Competition Authority, which started proceedings against both vintners' organisations in 1997 and 1998.

The authority believes that all the barriers to entry to the pub trade should be abolished to make it as easy to open a pub as a newsagents.

The measures introduced yesterday go some way towards fulfilling the Competition Authority's recommendation. However, the issue has been parked for the foreseeable future with a new Commission on Licensing which has a remit to continue the process of fundamental change in the law in this area.

The Government may already have reason to rue the decision to defer action on this issue. Last month the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, attributed much of the rise in drink prices, which in turn is helping drive inflation up, to profiteering publicans.

At the same time that Mr O'Donoghue was signing the necessary orders to bring the Intoxicating Liquor Act into effect, the Minister of State with responsibility for consumer affairs, Mr Tom Kitt signed a separate order freezing the price of many drinks in pubs, hotels and restaurants for six months. It effects the price of beer, whiskey, wine and a number of soft drinks.

The changes in opening hours and other licensing laws will not have that big an impact on the bulk of the members of the Irish Vintners' Federation, most of whom are small family-run concerns. "People running these pubs will still have the same lifestyle," predicts Mr Dunne.

Where the changes will make a difference is for those rural publicans who want to get out of the business. Previously they would have had to sell both the licence and the building to which it was attached which, as often as not, was also the family homes.

One measure that both vintners' groups are concerned about are the new laws to clamp down on underage drinking. Publicans will no longer be able to use the defence of "reasonable belief" and will be under an obligation to satisfy themselves as to the age of the person they are serving. Publicans who are convicted of serving alcohol to under-aged drinkers will have their premises closed down for seven days.