Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 17th November 2025 Grand Committee

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I put my name to Amendment 161 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, and I am interested in the themes in Amendment 173A, about which we have just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Howard of Rising, because I think that an assessment of and research into the impact of any kinds of advertising and sponsorship restrictions is very important moving forward. The reason why I am concerned about any advertising restrictions is that people who currently smoke and are looking to switch to vape can do so only if they know what vapes are and understand the facts around relative harms, where these products can be purchased and so on. Imposing these restrictions as written in the Bill without consultation would have grave unintended consequences. At the very least, there must be clearly defined exemptions.

In this House there is constantly talk about the problem of misinformation. I agree that we do not want people to be making judgments about anything based on misinformation or factual inaccuracy. Yet the difference between vaping and smoking is not well understood. Public Health England and, indeed, Doctor Khan’s independent review concluded that vapes are 95% less harmful than tobacco, yet misperceptions about the harm of vaping have risen at the same time. In 2025, 56% of adults believe that vaping is more harmful than or equally harmful as cigarettes, compared with 33% in 2022. In other words, misinformation is creating ever more misperceptions every year. Opinium research from July 2025 found that 51% of all respondents believe that vapes are equally harmful as or more harmful than smoking, with 48% of current smokers believing that. Certainly, they do not know that vapes and other nicotine products have 99% less toxicants than cigarettes. Curtailing the opportunity to provide public information on the relative benefits of vaping, as this Bill threatens to do, would further exacerbate this lack of understanding.

My concern is that a lot of the discussion is driven by a small but very loud portion of lobbyists who are very concerned about youth vaping rates. Lobbying groups particularly push that issue, as has the public health industry. Actually, the percentage of young people who vape is dwarfed by adult vapers, many of whom, as we have heard, have switched to vaping from smoking for health reasons. That safer alternative could now be in jeopardy unless we allow advertising to make it clear that vaping is in fact a desirable, healthy option. By putting forward the argument that vaping is not desirable and just as dangerous as smoking, we risk doing public health a real disservice.

Even now, vaping products are allowed only very restricted advertising since the Tobacco and Related Products Regulations came into force in May 2016. Additional to these restrictions, I fear that clauses in the Bill go so far as to treat vaping products as though they are the same as tobacco products. That sends an implicit message that nicotine, tobacco, smoking cigarettes and vaping are all much of a muchness. That is one of the themes that I have been pursuing: we need to have a much more granular, nuanced approach. Prohibiting any form of marketing for vape or nicotine product manufacturers directly undermines the important role that marketing has to play in encouraging smokers to switch to vaping or other nicotine products.

Just to finish off, there seems to be a complete contradiction. On the NHS Better Health webpage, it says in big letters, “Vaping to quit smoking”. I want to know: is that not advertising? It contains a range of information and advice for people who smoke and are looking to quit—in fact, I read it when I was smoking and looking to quit. It includes the message that you are roughly twice as likely to quit smoking if you use a nicotine vape compared with other nicotine replacement products, like patches or gum.

I want to ensure that adult smokers like me have access to information. When I read that, I then had to go out and find out about vapes. I went to the local vape shop and had a bit of a seminar. I then went to talk to the local convenience store and looked at the range of vapes. Then, as a consequence, I took up vaping and eventually gave up smoking—which I would have thought the Government want. If I had not been able to see where those vapes were on sale and to see and read the advertising and the marketing, then I might have stayed a smoker. This is not about me but about all the other smokers who as yet do not understand that vaping is a safer option than smoking. They might as well find out about it. I would have hoped that the Government would be encouraging, not discouraging, them.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I will speak against all the amendments in this group. They all, in various ways, could restrict or delay action by the Government—action that is urgently needed.

On vaping, I know that the Advertising Standards Authority has expressed concern about product placement on websites such as TikTok. There are concerns and, given the new technology and new media around, further action may well need to be taken on vaping. But I will focus on nicotine pouches; I hope that the Minister will be able to provide me with some information on them.

I note that today, for example, Convenience Store magazine reports that Imperial Tobacco has launched new nicotine pouches

“with five flavour options—Sweet Mint, Cool Mint, Watermelon Ice, Juicy Peach and Berry Blast”.

They apparently have a “better mouthfeel” than previous versions and smaller, slimmer tins that will fit conveniently in your pocket. That does not really sound like a stop smoking aid, does it? You will see these nicotine pouches in convenience stores, as the site of that announcement suggests—colourful tins with colourful labels stacked conveniently right beside the chewing gum. But this is not just about the nature of the product or where it is stored. I invite noble Lords to have a look next time they catch the Tube, where they will almost certainly see adverts for nicotine pouches.

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[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I was saying that, if noble Lords travel home on the Tube tonight, they will see at the side of pretty much every escalator at least one advert for nicotine pouches. Theoretically, these are stop smoking aids, but what does the advert say? It is along the lines of “Make your journey more pleasant; enjoy these favours”. If you are quick and have great eyesight, you might read in the small print as the escalator goes past, “Meant for under-18s for smoking cessation”, but that is not the message presented by the advert. I hope that the Minister will tell us how the Government are planning immediate action on the advertising of nicotine pouches, because it is clearly a huge issue.

It goes further than advertising to promotion. I recently went through Manchester Piccadilly station, where some bouncy young people with very sharp haircuts, in matching sports and leisure wear—that is probably how I should refer to it—were handing out free samples of nicotine pouches, mostly to young people who matched their demographic. That is not appropriate behaviour; it is not good for public health. We need to crack down on this. I come back to the delays and barriers that these amendments would cause to the Government’s action on nicotine products and offer the strongest possible opposition to them.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (Con)]

My Lords, in relation to the amendments in this group, first, I do believe that vaping is safer than smoking. All the evidence is that it is safer, but it is of course not risk-free. Indeed, that was the position under the previous Government: in October 2023 it was stated quite clearly that vaping is safer than smoking but it is not risk-free. If you do not smoke, do not vape.

I am all in favour of the promotion of vaping as a cessation tool for smoking; I think that is permitted under the Bill, and the Minister will no doubt cover that in response. I think we do need some way of promoting vaping, certainly for those who smoke, so that they can give it up. But if, as appears to be the case, everybody regards vaping as powerful for the cessation of smoking but for no other reason, because it is not risk-free, we should not be permitting advertising except in the narrow compass of the promotion of vaping as a cessation tool. For me, that would be the most sensible position, so I am not in favour of the amendments in this group.

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The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, is horrified. I do not want to talk about nicotine pouches, which is mainly what she spoke about, but she also spoke earlier about the flavours of vapes. We discussed the flavours and descriptors of vapes. I think she was offering a good illustration that my amendment about descriptors was right; it is the descriptor she found offensive, not the actual taste. In fact, she did not know what the taste was as I assume she never tasted them.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

Just to clarify for the noble Lord, everything that I was speaking about on flavours was about pouches, not vapes.

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

I beg the noble Baroness’s pardon, but I will still make my point about what she said about flavours. She was not describing the flavours; she does not know what the flavours are. She never bought them or consumed them as far as I imagine. She is talking about the descriptors—the rather lurid descriptors—just as my amendment is saying. That is what the Government should focus on, rather than flavours, which is what the Bill refers to. That is a digression back to an earlier group.

I simply want to say that the Government are in a state of tremendous confusion. They want us to have the information, but they do not want us to have too much information. What they have is a regime that is astonishingly oppressive and amazingly draconian, and which really ought not to stand as it does.

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[Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)]

I apologise for delaying the Committee. I was not having a cigar, as was suggested; I just got caught in the slow lane in the Lobby.

I shall come briefly to a conclusion. I ask the Minister for some clarification around the reality of how these proposals will be brought into play. I do not wish to speak on behalf of my fellow Peers but, clearly, there is a broad understanding across the Committee that we will end any form of advertising or promotion, except in specialist areas. I was pleased to see, and am grateful for, the carve-outs for specialist tobacconists, but we must ensure that these are proportionate and realistic; I assume that it is not the Government’s intention to impose a two-year prison sentence on someone who inadvertently passes on an advert for tobacco products or whatever it may be.

The “Internet services” clause needs serious consideration because, like all these laws that try to catch the provider, be it the telephone company, the internet service provider or whatever, from my experience, having sat where the Minister is, they are largely impractical. It is better to think practically about what these service providers can do, what sort of expectations we should be holding them to and how they can practically try to minimise the proliferation of adverts for tobacco products.

My final question to the Minister is, how can I receive my information as a legitimate enjoyer of an occasional cigar? How will I be given information online, which is how many people purchase their tobacco products perfectly legally? The Minister said that she is not looking to take action retrospectively on people who now enjoy a legal pastime but to bring in a smoke-free generation, but how will that conflict with my rights? How will I receive information? Can I receive the information that I want to receive in a way that enables me to distinguish easily between products, which requires some type of brand point, online, by email or through the websites of the suppliers? How is that going to work in practice? It is all very well to say that we do not want to have advertising. The reality is that it is perfectly reasonable for me to receive good information. I am sure that the Committee would want to make sure that that was safely delivered and appropriate rather than using the wrong type of legislation and a catch-all or a sledgehammer in order to try to crack this nut.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I will address just two amendments in this group. The first is Amendment 171 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, who powerfully and clearly introduced it as a probing amendment to the Government while very handily timing her intervention to remind me that it is in this group and that I have attached my name to it. I thank the noble Baroness for that.

We might say that there are different sides in this Committee, but everyone has agreed that adult smokers need to be able to get the information they need that this is an effective way to stop smoking. That is what this amendment does, and I do not think I need to say anymore on that.

I want to address briefly Amendment 172A in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, which is about restrictions on brand sharing. It is important to highlight why this amendment should not be part of the Bill. The process of brand stretching or brand sharing is something that we have seen the tobacco companies doing a great deal of. Mysteriously, expensive leather jackets, fancy sunglasses or even stationery suddenly start to bear various branding aspects—I will get to what those aspects are in a second—that just happen to echo that of a certain form of cigarettes. Governments very often find themselves playing a whack-a-mole game: if you try to ban this, then something slightly different appears and so on.

I particularly want to highlight the guidelines for implementation of Article 13 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control because this amendment very clearly goes against what that says. It notes that there needs to be an effective ban on all forms of tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship. I think it is worth quoting this because it highlights the ways in which the WHO is trying to catch everything because it has to try to catch everything:

“Promotional effects, both direct and indirect, may be brought about by the use of words, designs, images, sounds and colours, including brand names … or schemes of colours associated with tobacco products, manufacturers or importers, or by the use of a part or parts of words, designs, images and colours”.


The Government need all the powers they can possibly have to stop the merchants of death sneaking round into little gaps in the legislation.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lady Northover’s Amendment 171 in this group, along with the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. My noble friend has highlighted many egregious examples of the sort of advertising that the Bill needs to avoid through careful drafting. Her suggestion is explicit that advertising must not appeal to children, non-smokers or indeed anyone for whom these products are not intended, while ensuring that their core purpose as smoking cessation products is not impeded.

Amendment 171 would tighten up the wording of the Bill to achieve the Government’s intention. It would also future-proof it. We debated, on Amendments 195 and 196 from my noble friend Lord Russell, the need for reviews in the future, to give everyone the confidence that the Government will at least keep pace with—or preferably get ahead of—developments. We should include in those reviews any clever advertising and marketing intended to get round the Bill, as well as product development and emerging evidence of harms. Frankly, if the industry does not like it, it has only itself to blame because of its blatant and highly successful campaign to lure children to use its products.

On Amendment 161A, from the noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, about the removal of “reason to suspect”—

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In probing the Government on the evidence base, consultation, parliamentary scrutiny, oversight and accountability, we hope to understand how they intend to exercise the sweeping powers that they have granted themselves in the Bill. I hope the Minister is able to answer those questions. I beg to move.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, we have not yet heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, but I will speak briefly in opposition to the amendments just introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, particularly Amendments 175 and 179. I start from the point of view that the powers to extend smoke-free places in England, were Amendment 175 to pass, would be less than the powers in the devolved nations. As smoking prevalence continues to fall, there will clearly be an ongoing open discussion that appraises the evidence on smoke-free extensions and how best to protect public health and workers’ rights.

In August 2024, the Government indicated—well, apparently it was leaked—that they were going to extend these powers when bringing back the Bill. There was then a backlash, the Government U-turned and said that the consultation would focus only on schools, playgrounds and hospitals. That is disappointing, but we do not want to close down the opportunities and options for the future that would be available from this Bill.

Think about some of the other places that might be high-priority areas in the future, such as beaches. Very often, we experience big problems with litter and there are lots of small children on beaches. People have an expectation of fresh air there; that is one of the reasons why they go to the seaside. There are other places where exposure to second-hand cigarette smoke is particularly high. One example is transport hubs, but we can all think of other places where there are real issues and where we might want to keep the possibility of further extension open.

Finally, our medical understanding of the impacts of so-called passive smoking and second-hand cigarette smoke is growing and increasing all the time, and heading in only one direction. I note, for example, that just in the last week a major veterinary provider told pet owners to be aware of the impacts of passive cigarette smoke and vaping on pets. Our understanding of the impacts in this kind of area just keeps growing and growing, so we should not close down the possibilities in the Bill.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak first to my Amendment 176. As the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, said, his Amendment 178 does something very similar. As I have often said, policy should be based on evidence, so this amendment seeks to tease out exactly what evidence the Government plan to use when designating a new area as smoke-free.

The Government have already said that their consultation on further smoke-free areas will focus on schools, playgrounds and hospitals. It is fairly clear that areas in and close to schools should be smoke-free, in the same way that local authorities now have powers to prevent the opening of new fast-food outlets near schools because of the health dangers of much of their sales.

However, some playgrounds are very large and it is possible that a parent waiting on a bench for a child, well away from the play equipment, may want to smoke a cigarette—if they are of legal age, of course. Although it would set a bad example, it would be hard to understand the level of risk to the children playing; it would depend how far away they are. As for hospitals, many of them have already designated their grounds as smoke-free, although it has been hard to enforce. Many of us will have seen people smoking outside St Thomas’ Hospital, underneath the “No smoking” sign. Many hospitals have distinct outdoor smoking shelters. The matter is complicated, which is why my amendment probes the Government on the criteria they will use.

On the other hand, Amendments 175 and 179 seek to specify in the Bill the areas that can be designated as smoke-free. This could restrict the Government from acting in other areas in future. Obviously, we want the same rules in all parts of the UK, to save confusion. There are several reasons why the Government should not be limited in this way, and they must bear in mind the different circumstances that prevail in different areas. For example, as the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, mentioned, there are many children on beaches, and discarded cigarettes are a real litter problem, according to coastal local authorities. As she said, transport hubs may also come into focus, because of the crowded conditions in many of them, especially at certain times of the day such as rush hour. We think the Government need flexibility on this issue. Indeed, somebody might be more affected by second-hand smoke in a transport hub than at the far side of a very large playground, which is why I would like to see an evidence test.

We do not support Amendment 177 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, as the Government may want to restrict smoking in uncovered hospitality areas in the future. However, if they do so they will have to explain the reasons why, and we could debate it then. The fact is that the prohibition on smoking in indoor hospitality venues has proved very popular with customers and landlords alike and has certainly not had a damaging effect on footfall or expansion of the sector. The same might apply to uncovered hospitality areas in the future, if they are considered for the ban.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 11th November 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to the four amendments in this group that are in my name—Amendments 78, 86, 88 and 89. Particularly perceptive Members of our Grand Committee will remember that, when they looked at the third Marshalled List, the Minister had signed my Amendment 89. I understood at the time that she had signed it not for the same reason that I tabled it—as we discovered at the last sitting of the Committee, the Minister did not move a whole set of government amendments. We will doubtless return to those issues later.

My amendments are all of a piece. The object is to dive into Clause 38 and remove those parts that relate to money that is received through fines for licensing offences from the hands of the Consolidated Fund to put it into the hands of the local weights and measures authorities or—as we might get to, in due course—the relevant authority, which is the trading standards enforcement authority. My proposition is a terribly simple one: we should prioritise the receipt of resources not only from fixed penalty notices but from the fines imposed for licensing offences and they should be made available to local authorities with trading standards responsible for enforcement.

The background is probably well known to Members of the Grand Committee. Trading standards is operating with substantially fewer members of staff than it did a decade ago. The Local Government Association has warned that trading standards may be unable to fulfil its statutory duties and the Association of Chief Trading Standards Officers has warned of a growing gap between its statutory duties and the available resources.

Happily, today we meet with a realisation that this has not inhibited trading standards departments across the country from taking effective action together with the leadership of the National Crime Agency, which reported 2,700 premises—barber shops, vape shops and other trading establishments—operating illegally. Where vaping is concerned, which is our interest here, these are being used as a route for the sale of illegal vapes—without paying the appropriate duty or doing so in due course—including to minors, which is of particular concern for many noble Lords. There is also the employment of staff who are not properly able to work in this country.

A wide range of these issues requires enforcement. My purpose is to try to ensure that the resources that are clearly coming into the system are devoted to trading standards. We know, or at least it is estimated, that trading standards enforcement costs over the next five years will total something like £140 million. We know that the Government have provided a grant of £10 million to support trading standards. There clearly will be an income to local authorities from the fines relating to licensing to the extent that they will be able to recover their direct costs, as well as from the fixed penalty notices. We do not have an authoritative estimate of what that sum will be. If the Minister has a clear estimate of what the sums accruing to local authorities will be, it will give an opportunity to see how much of that £140 million cost over five years is likely to be met from penalties and fines.

This issue was debated in the other place and the Government, as is their wont, resisted the idea that money should be paid to local authorities from these fines, instead of being paid into the Consolidated Fund, because, as the Government put it, they did not want to create a perceived conflict of interest such that the enforcement authorities seemed to have an interest in pursuing fines. We should think of it the other way round. We want enforcement authorities to do their job properly. With these amendments, I am testing the proposition that the Government should increase the support for trading standards officers. If they find a provision that makes the revenue from fines to local authorities too much to bear, I should be supportive of a commitment by the Government—if not at this stage, then later—to assess the gap between the revenue that results from the fines and penalty notices and the costs to local authorities and to meet that gap by Exchequer grant, once they know what the Consolidated Fund revenues from these fines may be.

In addition to that request in principle to the Government, I have been looking at the impact assessment, which says in paragraph 1401:

“A new burdens assessment will be completed to assess costs to local authorities ahead of the Bill being introduced”,


particularly in relation to the enforcement of the new powers relating to vapes. I cannot find the burdens assessment—my research may be inadequate—but what does it say are the costs that need to be met by local government? That too should be something that we assess: to what extent is local government going to receive fixed penalty notices or fines that enable it to meet those costs? We do not want to be constantly adding statutory duties to local authorities without the corresponding resources.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I have attached my name to Amendment 81 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, from whom we have not yet heard—but that is the way the order works. I declare my position as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

I am slightly torn because the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, has just put forward a strong case. There are indeed huge problems with the funding of trading standards. I go to a recent report in the Financial Times in which the chief executive of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute said that the underfunding of trading standards has left consumers open to rogue traders and fake goods. There is a huge problem there and, as the noble Lord said, the Government’s own impact assessment says this measure is going to increase the burden and they are already hopelessly overburdened.

However, Amendment 81 goes in a different direction, towards public health initiatives to be determined by local authorities. Either of these has a strong case. I prefer the public health case, because public health is something that I am gravely concerned about. There is a real logic to the money going from where damage is being done to public health towards dealing with damage done by illegal activity.

I talked about how much trading standards is suffering. We all know that public health in the UK is in a terribly parlous state; when we compare ourselves with other countries that we might consider similar to ourselves, we are doing much worse in public health. I suspect that the Minister will get up and say, “Yes, but in February this year we gave £200 million to public health”, but that is to go towards smoking cessation programmes —which are very relevant to the Bill—along with addiction recovery, family and school nurses, sexual health clinics, local health protection services and public health support for local NHS services, and £200 million does not sound like quite so much when I read that list out.

There is a real logic to making sure that this is not just a small drop of money going into the ocean—the Treasury—and that the money goes to where the damage has been done, to public health. Trading standards would still be better than the money going straight into the Treasury. These are simple, logical ways to make sure that we stick some plasters on to some of the crises that are affecting our communities.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (Con)]

My Lords, in relation to this group, it is essential that trading standards have the resources they need. Although the government pledge of an additional £10 million is welcome, I feel it is probably not going to be enough. It is worth bearing in mind that trading standards are supportive of the Bill, and that is good news.

I understand the desire of my noble friend Lord Lansley to push the idea of the money being ring-fenced, as it were, for trading standards. As he acknowledged, there are dangers in that approach; we can think of overzealous traffic wardens and the criticisms that they have in relation to raising money that is ring-fenced for specific purposes, and there may be a danger of that happening here too. Still, I quite understand the desire to press for additional finance for trading standards, and I hope the Minister will say something on that in response because I think that is needed.

On Amendment 74, it seems eminently sensible to have a stepped approach to fines for offenders so that it is a proportionate response and first offenders do not have such a high fine as others. I am wholly supportive of that, and I hope the Minister is listening in that regard too.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 3rd November 2025 Grand Committee

Moved by

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle]

33: After Clause 16, insert the following new Clause—
“Prohibition on supply of cigarette filters in England and Wales(1) The Secretary of State and Welsh Ministers must make regulations having the effect of prohibiting the supply of cigarette filters or cigarettes containing cigarette filters, whether by way of sale or not, in the course of a business.(2) Subsections (6), (8), (9), (10), (10A), (10B), (10C) and (10D) of section 140 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 apply to regulations under this section as they apply to regulations under that section.(3) The notice required under section 140(6)(b) of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 as applied by subsection (2) in relation to the regulations mentioned in subsection (1) must be published no later than the end of the period of 12 months beginning with the day on which this Act is passed.(4) In this section—“cigarette filter” means a filter which is intended for use in a cigarette, whether as part of a ready made cigarette or to be used with hand rolling tobacco or other substances to be smoked in a cigarette.(5) Regulations under this section are subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new clause requires the Secretary of State and Welsh Ministers to make regulations which would prohibit the supply of cigarette filters or cigarettes containing cigarette filters.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 33 in my name, I will also speak to the related amendments in this group.

Amendment 33 has a very simple aim: to ban filters on cigarettes. I must start by saying that this is healthwashing. Filters on cigarettes have no health benefits. They were developed by the tobacco industry in the 1960s as a response to growing public concern over the link between smoking and lung cancer. An exposed internal note from the tobacco manufacturer Philip Morris stated that they are “an effective advertising gimmick”. They were deliberately developed to turn from white to brown in order to increase the perception that they filter the cigarette smoke; in reality, smokers simply inhale more deeply, drawing more smoke through the cigarette butt and even further into their lungs. The more recent trend of white filter tips, as compared to the older orange ones, reinforces this message with consumers. The evidence shows that young people, in particular, perceive cigarette packs with references to filters as containing cigarettes that are significantly less harmful than those contained by packs without such references.

Yet this is still not widely known. Look at the communications power of these merchants of death versus the health messages—of course, the merchants of death have a lot more money to put into the messages they are putting out. I acknowledge the support provided to me by Action on Smoking and Health in bringing forward this amendment; noble Lords who have received its briefing may well have noted that it strongly backs this amendment. Only one in four adults realise that filters do not protect smokers, so 75% of people still think that, because the filter is allowed to be there, it is sending a message of health: “There must be some health benefit, surely, or else why would the Government allow it?” That is my Amendment 33.

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[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I worry that this group of amendments indicates that, in the name of public health, state overreach can get completely carried away with itself. I ask that we take a step back and consider the state’s ability to interfere in the manufacture and R&D of legal products, which is completely disruptive to those products’ manufacture and design; if the state is going to do that, there needs to be a very good reason.

I want to look at some of the reasons that we have heard in relation to either a ban on or alteration of the use of filters. There seems to be some confusion as to whether this is an environmentalist issue or a public health issue. Is it litter, or is it plastic? What is it? This is a debate about tobacco and vaping, so let me concentrate on that. There is an idea that one in four adults does not know that filters are not healthy. As a long-standing smoker, I have to say that, while there are arguments about filters, I have never heard a smoker say, “I use a filter because they’re healthy”. There are a whole range of discussions about the use of filters—

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

I thank the noble Baroness for giving way. By way of correction, in case I was not clear, 75% of smokers do not know that filters do not have any health benefits; the stat is the other way round.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

The point I am making is that it is true that the majority of smokers do not sit around and discuss whether filters have a benefit to their health. I am quite sure that, had you asked me in that survey, I would not have had a clue. You would then say that I was being conned into using a filter. However, I would be indifferent because that is not the basis on which people smoke, either with or without filters. I am particularly bemused by the idea that, as a woman, if I saw a white filter, I would immediately think “purity” and be forced to smoke a white-filtered cigarette. I mean, goodness me—have we all gone mad?

I want to talk also about the idea of health warnings on actual cigarettes, which, again, is completely disruptive to product design and so on. It is completely petty. Sometimes, I feel as though the public health people have done everything and anything they possibly can and have run out of things to do, so they are now down to the narrowest possible thing: the cigarette itself.

It is interesting that this idea is aimed especially at young people who might be given one cigarette at a party; and that people seem to be saying that, if only such people saw that written warning, it would be enough to stop them. Were we ever young? Were we ever at a party? Did we ever read anything on the side of a cigarette that stopped us? The point I am making is that, as it happens, the majority of young people know that smoking is bad for you; many young people even give adults like me lectures on how smoking is bad for you. The idea of a written warning is not, I think, very helpful.

I just wonder what the health warning would say. Would it say, “Tobacco kills you”? What is it going to say? I have had an idea. Public perceptions on the difference between smoking and vaping are at their all-time worst. Only a minority of current adult smokers—29%—are able to recognise accurately that vaping is less harmful than smoking. So I have an idea: if we are going to have a message on the side of individual cigarettes, perhaps we could say, “Vaping is cheaper and less harmful than smoking”. That is a good message. Why do we not say that? We could even say, “Vaping is good for you”. The point I am making is that that is not where we should be putting messages; we have heard confused messages in this Committee so far.

My final thought is on the success of Canada and Australia in dealing with smoking, which has been cited and thrown into the conversation. Let us look at what is actually happening and today’s front-page headlines in Australia. The only success of Canada and Australia has been the huge growth of a black market in cigarettes and vapes. It is a disaster. Many people in public health are now saying, “Maybe we went too far”. So, before we start emulating them, maybe we should take different lessons. The front page of the Australian newspaper The Age today is about the fact that people are panicking about what they have inadvertently done. This group of amendments is the kind of thing that could lead us in completely the wrong direction.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I will gladly add to the brief points that I am going to make to the noble Lord. I was just about to turn to international comparisons. Sometimes, I feel the answer is “How long is a piece of string?” However, quite seriously, we constantly keep international comparisons under review because we are keen to learn and see. The challenge, which I will come on to, is to draw exact comparisons, for a range of reasons, including on what we are already doing.

On the point about international comparisons, it is important that we recognise that the UK already has some of the most stringent regulations in the world on tobacco packaging, which already emphasise health harms. This includes the requirement for plain packaging and graphic picture warnings on the outside of cigarette packets. As I have already referred to and noble Lords have discussed, we have announced that we will be introducing pack inserts to cigarettes and hand-rolling tobacco. I understand the motivation for these amendments, but we do not plan to introduce dissuasive cigarettes at this time. We will continue to monitor the evidence.

We are implementing many of the recommendations of the Khan review. This point was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Rennard. For example, we are majoring on the smoke-free generation policy, which is a major shift. Not only are we implementing many of these recommendations but we continue to keep them under review.

My noble friend Lady Ramsey asked about targets. Again, they will be kept under review. Unsurprisingly, our real target is delivering the Bill and designing the regulations so that they work. Some of this is also about where we can make the greatest impact in the quickest way, which is why we are focusing on the inserts rather than looking for additional things to do at this stage.

I hope that this is of some interest and reassurance to noble Lords and that they will feel able not to press their amendments.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this rich, full and powerful debate. The political breadth around this Committee showing concern and calling for more government action is notable. I thank the Minister for her contribution and her full answers.

I specifically want to address the questions raised by the noble Earl, Lord Russell, about so-called biodegradable filters. I understand why the noble Earl thought the figures for these and plastic filters sounded similar; that is because the figures are similar. I can quote to the noble Earl an article on this area from Waste Management in 2018 titled, “Comparison of cellulose vs. plastic cigarette filter decomposition under distinct disposal environments”. That basically comes up with plastic filters taking 7.5 to 14 years to disappear and biodegradable ones taking 2.3 to 13 years, so the figures are similar. The Government are drawing on similar figures.

The Minister said both types are harmful to the environment and the natural world. There I will point to a study published in Environmental Pollution in 2020 titled, “Smoked cigarette butt leachate impacts survival and behaviour of freshwater invertebrates”. I have now referenced all the evidence in that space that the noble Earl might like to go away and look at.

This has been a hugely rich debate. I thank in particular the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, for giving us the irony story of the day about tobacco companies being concerned about toxic ink on their products. I think we probably should have a cartoonist in the Room at this point. We have had a great deal of consensus across the Committee about the need for action; the one stand-out different position was taken by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox. However, I do not share her concern about the welfare of cigarette manufacturers or the purity of their product design. Like the noble Lords, Lord Crisp and Lord Bourne, I think public health should be a matter of government policy, and I am delighted to have signed the noble Lord’s amendment in the planning Bill later so we will be back together on that one.

I particularly thank the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsey, who very bravely brought before us two family tragedies to illustrate that, in the end, we are talking here about human lives, people’s parents, people’s children and the suffering that comes from the merchants of death. The noble Lord, Lord Patel, brought his medical expertise, and the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, cited an important academic study that I hope the Minister will take a good look at in terms of action.

The response from the Minister to the noble Lord, Lord Young, was that the Government could regulate. I am afraid that what we would like to hear and what these amendments are seeking is for the Government to take action. I suggest that “could” is not good enough in these circumstances. It is worth saying that we are not talking about an either/or here. I am sure everyone very much welcomes the smoking cessation efforts that the Minister referred to, but people will continue to smoke, and we want to reduce the health and environmental harms that result.

Finally, the noble Lord, Lord Young, made an important point about cigarettes being close to your eyes and the small print. I point out that most of the people we are targeting here are young people who will not, as I do, have to get the bifocals at exactly the right line to be able to read seven-point print. I think that covers all that has been said here.

One thing I will add is that the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, referred to my amendment and others as probing amendments. I am afraid that is not my intention. I am obviously going to withdraw the amendment now, but I have full intentions of bringing it back. I hope the Minister might be open to discussions beforehand. In your Lordships’ House we have medical experts and people with real expertise, and we might be able to tease out some of the issues raised today in terms of the health damage being done by filters. What would it be like if we got rid of filters?

My final point, in responding to the Minister, is about the limited evidence of the harm of filters. We have strong evidence, established over decades, that there is no health benefit from filters. In the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, we are seeking to follow the leadership of Australia and Canada in putting markings on individual cigarettes, but perhaps we could be the leaders in banning filters. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 33 withdrawn.

Human Medicines (Authorisation by Pharmacists and Supervision by Pharmacy Technicians) Order 2025

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Tuesday 21st October 2025 Grand Committee

Finally, I would like to ask my noble friend the Minister a question in relation to Northern Ireland. She made the point that no statutory registration of pharmacy technicians in Northern Ireland has yet taken place. But the process to make it a legally regulated profession has been approved and is moving forward. In fact, the Minister of Health in Northern Ireland back in 2022 issued a consultation that was actually approved. So why has there been a delay? What discussions has my noble friend the Minister had with the current Minister of Health, or what discussions will she be having in future? What seems to be the obstacle? To me, it seems practical common sense by ensuring that pharmacists can deliver face to face contact with patients, thereby freeing up the NHS and GPs.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her very clear introduction of this SI. It is a pleasure to follow the noble Baronesses, Lady Hollins and Lady Ritchie, and to say, perhaps counterintuitively, that I agree with both of them. It is very clear that there are arguments for steps forward because of the way in which circumstances and technology have changed: there is an argument for reform. But the questions put by the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, are very important and we have to put those into context.

I note that a survey put out in August by the National Pharmacy Association and Community Pharmacy England said that 63% of pharmacies could close in the next year and only 6% of pharmacies were profitable. Only 25% of pharmacies are independent; the rest are either corporate or supermarket-owned pharmacies.

The concerns are obvious when we are talking about that last group. There is a risk of seeing one pharmacist having effective control and providing authorisation to a large number of pharmacy technicians where there might be corporate structures that put a large amount of pressure on financial returns rather than ensuring absolute safety and the controls that are needed. So we need to understand this SI in that context. Obviously, in some ways that is what is driving the SI, but we also need to think about the controls and where there is huge financial pressure on independence. A majority of prescriptions now come through giant corporate companies with very distant methods of control.

My second question is on timing. I note that on 1 October the General Pharmaceutical Council opened its consultation on overhauling the pharmacy technician training framework, including plans to move study from level 3 to level 4. It rather feels that we have just opened a consultation on changing the training, yet here we are bringing in regulations that almost seem to be assuming that that training has already been stepped up. Would it not be a better idea to step up and overhaul the training and then bring in the different regulations? The consultation suggests there is a very clear understanding that there is a need to improve the training of pharmacy technicians.

My final set of questions has to go back to physician and anaesthesia associates and the Leng review. I would like to understand how this SI fits within the broader framework of regulation of all the medical professions. I note, looking back over the history of this, that we go back to 2014 and the Law Commission recommendations about the regulation of a new single legal framework for health and care professionals. Under the previous Government we had consultations in 2017, 2019 and 2021, all of them in this space. So far as I have been able to discover, they did not seem to cover physician technicians: certainly not in much detail. This whole physician and anaesthesia associates débâcle, I have to say, was supposed to be part of a whole process of looking at all stages of medical regulation right across the board. How does this SI fit within that framework?

Finally, I have to note that, in the Chamber on 16 July, I was told that the Government would be delivering an implementation plan for the Leng review in the autumn. I have noticed that quite a lot of leaves seem to be changing their colour at the moment. I know that the government definition of “autumn” can be quite extended, but perhaps the noble Baroness could update us on when we can expect to see that implementation plan.

[Lord Scriven (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. In fact, it is a pleasure to follow all noble Baronesses who have spoken and to be the first Baron to speak in this debate. A bit like the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, I counterintuitively support quite a lot of what has been said, even though some of it is quite contradictory and does prompt questions, even though the generality is supported.

I also thank the Minister for outlining in a clear and understandable way the order before the Committee. In my role as vice-chair of the APPG on Pharmacy, I have been able to speak not only to a number of organisational groups but to individual pharmacists to understand some of the differences of opinion within the sector.

This is without doubt a pivotal moment, marking a significant shift in pharmacy regulation. I offer the Government our general support for the core principle of modernising an outdated legal framework to unlock clinical capacity. As the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, pointed out, for far too long—in fact, since 1933—regulations have been rigid, forcing highly qualified pharmacists to oversee tasks that can be safely and competently managed by other registered professionals.

This order, by introducing the concept of authorisation and delegation to pharmacy technicians, corrects this historical anomaly. The benefits are clear; it empowers pharmacists to fully embrace clinical roles: prescribing, consulting and administering services, probably as part of the new neighbourhood health services that the 10-year plan suggests. It validates the expertise of pharmacy technicians, providing them with greater autonomy, particularly in complex environments like hospital aseptic facilities. It introduces, to use the Minister’s phrase, common sense measures of allowing trained staff members to hand out pre-checked, bagged medicines in the pharmacist’s temporary absence, ending needless patient delays.

However, the consultation process responses, which saw over 5,000 replies, revealed a sector divided. Although professional bodies and pharmacy technicians largely welcomed the proposals, we must not ignore the fact that many individual pharmacists expressed profound concern, as quite rightly highlighted by the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins. It is here in the detail and the perceived risk that we must focus our scrutiny. Indeed, while welcoming the statutory instrument, there could be some unintended consequences. The issues raised are not frivolous; they are structural and require ministerial assurance.

I wish to highlight three major areas of risk. The first one is patient safety, training and accountability. The core objection from many pharmacists relates to the level of initial education and training required by pharmacy technicians to take on these new autonomous roles. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, pointed out, the consultation has just started. It ends on 24 December. It will not pick up pace until at least early 2026, and then there will be the training, the qualifications for the training and the accountability for the training. Are the Minister and the Government convinced that there is enough time to roll out not just the training but to assure its quality before technicians are allowed to do this?

The noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, has really highlighted the problems that could come around with vague authorisation. If a pharmacist gives a general or oral authorisation without clearly defining the scope, conditions and limitations for the technician, it could lead to confusion and mistakes, particularly concerning high-risk medicines. I was going to ask similar questions to the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, but I will leave those to one side.

There also is, potentially, an accountability gap. While the order notes that a pharmacist’s failure to have a

“due regard to patient safety”,

may lead to professional misconduct, establishing clear accountability when a technician makes an accuracy error under general supervision could be challenging for regulatory bodies. There is a contradiction there that needs to be understood.

Also, on dispensing queries, the new rule allowing a sale supply of ready dispensed products in the pharmacist’s absence creates a challenge. For example, will a shop assistant who has been there for one day and works in the pharmacy be allowed to do this? It does say “any member”, so I am pleased that the Minister is shaking her head. I seek reassurance on that particular point.

What if a patient has a question about the medicine? The person carrying out the transaction must know when they are qualified to answer and, crucially, when they must stop the transaction. How will this be addressed and understood by all concerned? The safety mitigation is reliant on the General Pharmaceutical Council-strengthened guidance and rules—work that is still pending, as we have heard. We must ensure that this guidance provides absolute clarity on the minimum competence standards required for authorisation and, crucially, that the professional indemnity cover for those roles is appropriate for the new scope of the responsibility.

Secondly, on the risk of undervaluing dispensing services, as the Minister said, the changes are enabling and not mandatory, yet the risk of financial exploitation is real. Pharmacies are already funded below cost for dispensing. My concern mirrored—

HIV: Testing and Medical Care

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Monday 20th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I certainly agree that giving people who are attending an emergency department a blood test as part of a routine examination—unless they opt out—has assisted very much in engaging people in care and in identification. We have 79 emergency departments in the programme and they are making a substantial contribution. We will continue to assess where it is successful and how we can extend the success into areas that are not currently benefiting.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, there has been a decline in the rate of testing of 16 to 24 year-olds, which is deeply concerning. Are the Government going to tackle that as a matter of urgency, recognising the need to target that group in particular?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

As I have mentioned, the plan—which is due to be published by the end of this year—will include a focus on HIV testing and will take account of the groups that are less likely to be tested, because that will be key to our success in eradicating new HIV transmissions by 2030.

Preterm Birth Committee Report

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Friday 6th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I join in the general and fervent thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Patel, and his committee for this terribly important report. I also thank the noble Lord for his introduction to this debate.

The noble Lord, Lord Patel, mentioned an issue that I would like to start with: the situation of our current final year midwifery students. The Royal College of Midwives did a survey and found that 84% of them said that they are not confident that they are going to find a job after graduating this year. This makes no sense at all. We are in the middle of calculating the formula for exactly how many midwives we need, but, if we look at the figures from the Royal College of Midwives, we see that a survey of members recently found that midwives and maternity support workers were working an estimated 118,000 unpaid hours of overtime each week to meet the needs of their patients. We should be grabbing those graduating midwives with both hands and making sure that they have a secure future because, of course, they now face the enormous weight of student debt, with many of them being previous graduates who are doing this as a second degree. There is a risk that they will go and do something else because they need to put food on the table and keep a roof over their head. Of course, this is a situation that many resident doctors and anaesthesiologists already face; as the Minister will know, I have put down Written Questions on that issue.

I turn to the specific issue of preterm births. Here, I will focus not on the care but on the public health issues. We have heard in this debate a great deal from many expert figures about the fact that, in many cases, we do not know the cause of a preterm delivery. However, one thing we do know is that poverty, inequality and discrimination increase the level of suffering around preterm births. The most recent figures show that the neonatal mortality rates associated with preterm birth in the most deprived areas have just increased for the third year in a row. We are going backwards.

The data on preterm birth and neonatal mortality is not nearly good enough, but it is clear that minority communities are suffering a double, intersectional disadvantage. Let me make a statement of the obvious: reducing deprivation and poverty would reduce preterm birth. I do not believe that anyone would disagree with that. Drawing on the Bliss briefing, I ask the Minister this: in terms of the Government’s response to the committee’s first recommendation, what are the future metrics, targets and ambitions? Are the Government making progress in that area?

Most of my speech will address an issue that no noble Lord has yet addressed—nor, I suspect, will address. I am going to focus on One Health and the environmental health aspects that undoubtedly contribute to preterm birth, even if we do not understand the precise details.

Our environment is in a terrible state, and those who are pregnant are particularly vulnerable to that disastrous environment. Our planet has been choked in plastics and soaked in pesticides. We have seen drugs ending up out in the environment, creating antimicrobial resistance and other deleterious medical effects.

I start with a deeply shocking study, which came out after the committee reported. It is only one study, but it is seriously indicative. It was presented to the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine’s annual meeting early this year—the pregnancy meeting. Investigators at the University of New Mexico analysed 175 placenta, 100 deliveries at term and 75 pre term. The level of microplastics and nanoplastics in the placenta was significantly higher with the preterm births and much higher than previous levels of microplastics and nanoplastics that have been measured in human blood. Clearly, the placenta is concentrating microplastics and nanoplastics in the maternal blood. However, what is deeply concerning is that the preterm births have higher rates than the full-term births, which is counterintuitive. If this was a gradual accumulation over a time that was not associated with the preterm birth, you would expect the longer-term ones to have more plastic.

I come now to PFASs, generally known as “forever chemicals”. Two studies were published in 2023 showing an association between the level of PFAS in maternal blood and the rate of preterm birth. The study in environmental health, Siwakoti et al, showed that it was particularly affecting male babies, and that the accumulation in male babies was higher than that in female babies. Noble Lords here who are experts will tell us that male babies are more fragile at birth. PFAS is concentrating more in those babies, with potential effects which we do not yet understand but which are deeply concerning. Another study, from the Emory University, found that mothers with higher levels of PFAS in pregnancy are 1.5 times more likely to have a baby born three weeks before their due date or earlier—the preterm babies we are talking about. The early term, one to two weeks before, is also raised.

We also know that we have pesticides all around our environment. Noble Lords might have seen a recent environmental study which showed extraordinarily high levels of glyphosate—the chemical to which we are all very heavily exposed to—in tampons. Glyphosate in maternal blood levels is associated with higher levels of preterm birth. More broadly, on pesticide exposure, a lot of this is uncertain, and all of it is very complicated, but another a meta-analysis suggests some of the ways in which pesticides might be having impacts on preterm birth. They might be triggering inflammation and oxidative stress and disrupting endocrine functions.

Finally, there is the microbiome. The noble Lord, Lord Winston, mentioned our starting to understand that the vaginal microbiome is significant in terms of preterm birth and many other aspects of health. A study from 2023 showed that there was a unique genetic profile in the microbiome of preterm births. There was a higher richness of diversity of microbes and a greater diversity of antimicrobial resistance genes. We have here a real problem with the vaginal microbiome and issues that we do not yet have much understanding of. Unfortunately, the noble Lord, Lord Leong, is not currently in his place, but I cross-reference here the debate that the noble Lord and I had, and an amendment that this House voted on, about regulating period products. An issue that I raised in the context of period products was reusable period products that have high levels of silver and nanosilver, which demonstrably have negative effects on the vaginal microbiome. Also, with the tampons I was talking about earlier, there are the pesticides but there is also evidence of heavy metals, which will have impacts on the vaginal microbiome.

I apologise for this having been a rather depressing speech. However, this situation is not inevitable. Companies are making products that are threatening the health of all of us very broadly, but particularly the most vulnerable in our society—those who are pregnant and the young babies who will be born prematurely. This is an area in which we need urgent government action. I have cited very recent studies, and the knee-jerk reaction to the Government from the Civil Service on these kinds of issues tends to be, “We’ve got to wait for more data and information”. However, if noble Lords look at the list of things that I have gone through, they will see that each one was a case where researchers were looking at one product and one factor, in isolation. No pregnant person is exposed to just one of these factors; everyone is being exposed to all of these as a cocktail, and the levels of all of them are going up all the time. Once we have put them out into the environment, we are unable to take them out. Surely, on preterm birth, on the state of the health of the nation, we need to apply the precautionary principle and take urgent action to rein in the corporates who are exposing us to all these threats.

Complications from Abortions (Annual Report) Bill [HL]

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Committee stage
Friday 6th June 2025 Lords Chamber

For these reasons, I hope that we will move rapidly to the compliance checks, so that the NHS can take advantage of whatever suggestions or proposals are made by the statistics regulator. If public confidence in the statistics systems drains because they are based on merely partial evidence, open government will be the loser. I hope that, on Report, we can consider some of the questions again. I oppose, for the moment, the proposal of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I offer Green group support for the proposition from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton. I almost feel that I do not need to, given that the noble Baroness, Lady Freeman of Steventon, very powerfully made the argument that the Bill unnecessarily exceptionalises abortion when there are very comparable procedures conducted in similar procedural ways—hip replacements and cataract operations. Yes, we need to improve the collection of statistics, but we do not have a Bill before us to do that. By definition, the exceptionalising that is going on is very obvious.

I want to pick up on two comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Weir of Ballyholme, and most respectfully to disagree with him. The noble Lord said that what is happening in the US is not relevant here. I spoke at Second Reading about the influence and money flowing from the United States of America into the UK. I can update your Lordships’ House on that. I was going back as far 2014, and a chapter of a book I wrote addressing these issues. This has been highlighted by Peter Geoghegan, who wrote Democracy for Sale, and others. The so-called Alliance Defending Freedom from the US provides massive funding. In 2020, it put £324,000 into a similarly named organisation in the UK. By 2024, that had risen to £1.1 million of the organisation’s total income of £1.3 million. We are debating this Bill in the context of that flood of US money seeking to influence what is happening in the UK.

I put Written Question HL6542 to the Government about this. I am afraid that the Government are not taking this with the seriousness that it deserves for defending our democracy. The Answer referred to lobbying of the Government and what measures the Government have in place. We need to think about the measures that we need across our society to deal with the inequality of financial arms that is occurring in these debates because of the money flooding in from certain forces within the US.

The noble Lord, Lord Weir, also said that the context did not really matter. However, this Bill appears before us in the context of more than 60 MPs in the other place backing one amendment—there is another one too—to decriminalise abortion, to end the exceptionalisation of abortion right across our law. That would make this Bill look particularly strange and ill-fitting. For those reasons, I support the proposition from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, unfortunately, I too was unable to be at Second Reading. I speak today to support the stand part notice from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, and on what the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, said about the important review of data collection—actually, across the health sector, as I will explain, but particularly of data relating to abortions.

The noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, spoke of how some elements of this short Bill are inconsistent, which makes it unable to deliver what the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, hopes for, despite what he said—I will come on to explain why—even if it were the right thing to do. I agree with the points that the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, made.

One issue at the heart of this inconsistency is the use of patients’ confidential health personal data. There is an absolute presumption by patients that their health personal data will always be kept confidential between them and their medical practitioners. Indeed, noble Lords may remember, when the then Government proposed care.data plans a few years ago, it became clear that we were likely to move to a US-type system of allowing researchers, insurers et cetera access to anonymised and pseudonymised data. I can tell the noble Baroness, Lady Lawlor, that, during that debate, it was important to note that it is possible to reverse most anonymised and pseudonymised data, particularly when dealing with an unusual circumstance. Once you have one or two identifiers, you can get to a very small geographic position very quickly—sometimes to a postcode, frankly. Therein lies the problem: confidentiality is lost.

More worrying were the original proposals in the Bill that became the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, which gave the police and the Home Secretary—then Priti Patel—the power to demand from any relevant person or authority, which included health authorities at the time, to see data that might be of interest in an investigation. I was working on that Bill and, when I queried this power in your Lordships’ House, it transpired that it was not just for suspects of crime but for anyone connected with the incident, who might or might not be a witness. That went completely against everything in a doctor’s sacred oath of confidentiality with regard to their patient. I am pleased to say that, following my amendments to that Bill and pressure from doctors, the then Clause 16(4)(a) was modified to prevent access to health data compared to data from other bodies, where it still sits.

That was followed by a debate, on the Health and Care Bill, about the use of patients’ personal health data for research. My noble friend Lord Clement-Jones, other noble Lords and I made it very clear that assuming that anonymised or pseudonymised data could not be reverse-engineered was not acceptable. Out of that, a new system of a black box, where the anonymity of patients is guaranteed, was introduced.

However, abortion data is different because it is not within these safeguards. The Abortion Act 1967 requires that the woman’s name and date of birth or a personal identifier must be submitted on every abortion and provided to the Chief Medical Officer via the abortion notification system. While, as others have said, this data includes complications prior to discharge, the “Hospital Episode Statistics” referred to in Clause 1(3)(b) of the Bill from the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, are based only on abortion data from trusts, which are not linked to abortion records. This means that the data is coming from two different sources, which are collecting different data. As the briefing from BPAS tells us, neither dataset actually captures all abortion complications, nor can the hospital episode statistics be analysed by methods of gestation or abortion—another difference, yet again. I do not think that the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, covered that point of disparity when he spoke earlier. My worry is that the annual report would not actually reflect the wider picture.

The second issue that I will raise is of those other delicate areas that might inadvertently be drawn into this type of reporting on complications of abortion. In the debate earlier today in your Lordships’ House, we discussed miscarriages and preterm births. Nearly 50 years ago, I had an early miscarriage and, when I went to the hospital, I was told that I was having a “spontaneous abortion”—a ghastly phrase. I still had remnants inside my body that needed to be removed to ensure a “complete abortion”—an even more ghastly phrase. In the middle of my grief at losing my first baby, the medics were talking about “abortion”.

The very helpful briefing from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists points out that the differing terms that can be entered into hospital coding are “induced miscarriage” and “spontaneous abortion”. It says:

“This can result in a code being applied for an abortion complication when it should have been for a miscarriage complication and vice versa.”


This is not just about words such as “spontaneous abortion”. Following on the speech from the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, in the USA, since the Dobbs case, miscarriage has increasingly been brought into the debate about abortion. West Virginia has one of the toughest sets of abortion laws, allowing it only for cases of rape, incest or if the woman has an ectopic or totally non-viable pregnancy. But it gets worse. Last week, in Raleigh County, West Virginia, the prosecuting attorney, Tom Truman, advised women to get in touch with police, law enforcement or a doctor if they were worried that they might be charged with mishandling foetal remains. The example cited was the arrest of a woman for disposing of foetal remains in her bins. He said that a number of criminal charges under state code, including felonies, could be levied against a woman who flushes foetal remains, buries them or otherwise disposes of them following an involuntary abortion, also called a miscarriage. A West Virginian woman in my situation, which I talked about earlier, could well be prosecuted. The miscarriage that I referred to is not unusual. I lost the tiny foetus down the toilet, and I was distressed beyond measure. In West Virginia, you would now have to retrieve the foetal remains or be at risk of prosecution.

I am sure that there is absolutely no intention in the UK for this to happen, but the debate happening in the US is beginning to colour the debate we are having here. I am very clear that the problem is that some people want miscarriage to be treated as suspicious. They clearly are not medics. It is thought that 15% to 20% of pregnancies end in miscarriage. It is surprisingly common, and good luck to that prosecutor in West Virginia. He is going to spend his entire time on people reporting miscarriage. Above all, the issue of miscarriage and spontaneous abortion is yet another that muddles the data proposed in this annual report and demonstrates, sadly, that it is not fit for purpose.

Creon

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Thursday 5th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I believe that we are looking at this very seriously. Of course, medicine supply chains are complex, global and highly regulated, so there are a number of reasons why supply can be disrupted and a number of reasons why supply might not be specifically as we would like. Unfortunately, some of those are out of government control. To be honest, we cannot prevent all medicine shortages, but we can take as many steps as possible. I can assure my noble friend that the whole point about increasing resilience of the UK medicine supply chain remains a key priority. We work with industry, we work with the regulator and we will improve the position of the UK as a destination for life sciences and manufacturing in this regard.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, the Minister referred to Creon being needed for a number of conditions. In Sheffield, when I was visiting POLARIS, the pulmonary lung and respiratory imaging centre, I met a mother of a cystic fibrosis patient—a young child, quite a small child—and that mother was suffering significant distress at having to spend time chasing around Sheffield to try to lay hands on Creon. The Minister just said that this is out of government control. Does she agree that this is a case where relying on markets to supply essential drugs is not working and that there needs to be more government control in the supply chain?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

The noble Baroness puts forward an interesting perspective. There will always be a number of matters that are outside any Government’s control. What is in the Government’s control is what action we can take. In terms of alternatives to Creon, for example, supplies of Nutrizym have more than doubled since last year, and Essential Pharma has also secured additional manufacturing capacity for Pancrex. In May last year, pancreatin preparations—the active ingredient in the medicine we are talking about—were added to the list of medicines that cannot be exported from the UK or hoarded in order to reserve supplies. These actions, along with some of the ones that I have just mentioned and more, all show a very active government position.

Health: Ultra-processed Food

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

As the noble Lord will be aware, we are committed to implementing the TV and online advertising restrictions for less healthy foods and drinks. That is one of a number of steps that we are taking to tackle obesity, as per the question from the previous noble Lord. There is a direct link between advertising and intake, particularly with children, so I am glad that we will be introducing regulations to take effect in January—in fact, the industry has agreed to comply in advance of that, which shows a constructive approach. As for further information, the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition will consider evidence again in 2026, next year, and make dietary recommendations. The Government continue to invest in research through the NIHR and the UKRI.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

Further to the regulations that the Minister mentioned that are coming in January, the Labour manifesto promised to prohibit unhealthy food ads online and before 9 pm, which was to come into effect in October. Can the Minister confirm that the rules that are coming in January are in fact watered down and will not forbid the advertising of brands? Does she think that advertising a brand but not a product—say, McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken or Greggs—will promote the consumption of fresh fruit and vegetables?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

First, I do not accept that the advertising restrictions represent any watering down. In May, a Written Ministerial Statement set out, to the noble Baroness’s point, that the Government will provide a brand exemption in legislation. The restrictions will come into force officially on 5 January. I realise that the noble Baroness regards this as not the position that she would choose, but I believe that it will provide certainty for businesses to invest in advertising campaigns with confidence and encourage them to develop more healthy products—that is the situation that we want—as well as protecting UK children from the harms of junk food advertising.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 23rd April 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, coming so far down the list in your Lordships’ debate—the number of speakers demonstrating the strength of feeling on the issue on all sides of the House, mostly slanted in the direction of seeking to do more to take on big tobacco—I am seeking not to repeat what has already been said, but rather, to highlight a couple of issues that I expect to pick up in Committee.

However, first, I will answer the question of the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey of Didcot, not currently in his place, about what the Bill is for—or rather, what the Green Party thinks it should be for. The Bill should aim to sound the death knell of big tobacco: the merchants of death who have preyed on vulnerable people, particularly children, hooking them for life. Their products have shortened lives, as the noble Lord, Lord Stevens of Birmingham, pointed out, at great financial and personal cost to those individuals, while providing spectacular profits for those companies. As regulation has sought to restrict their indefensible trade, they have twisted and turned, lobbied and wrestled, dodged and shapeshifted into new and harmful forms.

One of those forms is nicotine pouches, as the noble Earl, Lord Howe, highlighted. This issue was brought home to me on 9 September 2024; I know that because I documented what I saw on social media. At Manchester Piccadilly station, a giant yellow booth almost blocked the entrance. It was surrounded by a group of smiling young people, welcoming and warm, seeking to hand out such pouches to random passers-by. The company’s name is Velo, and a little research uncovered that it is owned by British American Tobacco. Well, shame on you, British American Tobacco, for peddling to young people, at random, a dangerous and addictive poison. You are besmirching the good name of our country by your actions.

Of course, those actions are taking place around the world. Our focus today has been on the UK, but I ask the Minister—I will understand if she chooses to write to me later—what steps the Government are taking to stop British-based and British-linked companies continuing their immoral peddling around the world. The UK was known back in the age of the opium wars as a narco-state; we surely do not want to be one today. I am going to see whether it is possible to address this issue in Committee.

The World Health Organization estimates that there are 1.25 billion adult tobacco users around the world. So, about one in five adults worldwide consume tobacco, which is an improvement on the figure for 2000, when one in three did so. But that is not on track to meet the global goal of a 30% reduction from the 2010 baseline. Why? Let us take a clue from the slogan for this year’s World No Tobacco Day, which is 31 May. The slogan is:

“Protecting children from tobacco industry interference”.


My final point picks up an issue raised powerfully by the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, about the deceptive, deceitful behaviour of the industry and its regular indulging in healthwashing, greenwashing and astroturfing—all the techniques of well-funded dodgy public relations. On the subject I am about to raise, the industry even took a shot at me. The email to me came from [e-mail] via parliament.uk, and was signed “Mariana”—first name only, no company name, no other identification. It asked me to back an amendment to bring in a ban on plastic filters on cigarettes.

In my reference to this, I am drawing on the great work of Action on Smoking and Health to highlight the fact that cigarette filters offer no health benefits. They were introduced by the tobacco industry not to protect health but to create the illusion of a safer cigarette. They have rightly been called the deadliest fraud in human history. These filters are made from single-use plastics and are an environmental disaster. In the UK they account for two-thirds of all littered items and cost councils £40 million a year to clean up. But so-called biodegradable filters are still toxic, break down only under certain conditions and provide a false sense that there is some kind of eco-responsibility so you do not have to worry about the problem. They give tobacco companies the chance to continue their greenwashing and healthwashing. The real solution is simple: ban all cigarette filters. I hope the Government will consider bringing in such a ban.