Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Debate between Earl of Liverpool and Lord Moylan

Committee stage
Tuesday 11th November 2025 Grand Committee

[The Earl of Liverpool (Con)]

My Lords, as this is the first time that I have risen to speak on this Bill, I should immediately declare an interest, as shown in the register: I am a member of the Commons and Lords Pipe and Cigar Club. It may be no surprise to the Grand Committee that I strongly support the amendments that have so far been spoken to.

This is an industry that goes back 6,000 years—some people would say 6,000 but maybe 1,000 years will do. It is a very specialised business and, as my noble friend Lord Johnson said, cigar consumption and the purchase of cigars in this country is of great benefit to our tourist industry. People really do come to look at what we have to offer in St James’s Street and elsewhere. It is a wonderful thing, and I offer my full support to these amendments.

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

I put my name to some of these amendments, but so much has been said, and so eloquently, that I will speak only briefly in their support. I have no personal interest in this. I used to smoke, but I stopped three years ago. I have never smoked cigars or pipes, and I never took snuff. I probably experimented with all of them at some stage, but they were not for me. So I have no personal interest in this—but I was moved to take an interest in it because of being approached by a neighbour, recently retired from the family business of Hunters & Frankau, which specialises almost exclusively in cigars and is a successful British business that has been around for a long time, bringing pleasure with very little harm to its customers and giving jobs to people in the economy. He and his colleagues pointed out to me that the way in which this Bill operates will be absolutely destructive to their business; they will no longer be able to continue in business as a result of this Bill, for reasons that have been explained by my noble friend Lord Lindsay and other noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. I really do not think that that is what the Government intend.

This measure does not mean that the business will be destroyed. The businesses will be destroyed but not the commerce, because it will still be perfectly legal to buy these things in foreign countries and import them into this country. One can never imagine the French to be so idiotic as to clamp down on a luxury trade that brings custom to their capital—nor the Germans, for that matter. These products will always be available, but the businesses in this country that have operated for such a long time will be reduced to cinders and ashes if the Government do not step back at this stage—I hope the Minister will say that she is willing to do this—and say that they will reconsider this whole question before coming back to the Bill at a later stage.