Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Lord Udny-Lister Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 11th November 2025 Grand Committee

Moved by

[Lord Udny-Lister]

74: Clause 37, page 19, line 33, leave out “must be £200” and insert “committed by a person for the first time and deemed serious by a local weights and measures authority must be £500 if the amount is paid before the end of the period of 14 days following the date of the notice, and otherwise £1,000.
(4A) If the fixed penalty notice is not the first notice issued to the person in respect of such an offence, the fine is—(a) £2,500, if it is the second fixed penalty notice so issued;(b) £5,000, if it is the third fixed penalty notice so issued;(c) £10,000, if it is the fourth or any subsequent fixed penalty notice so issued.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to create a stepped approach to fixed penalty notices based on how many times a person has been issued a notice.

[Lord Udny-Lister (Con)]

My Lords, I have tabled two amendments in this group, both with the intention of creating a stepped and more proportionate approach to fixed penalty notices, which I feel to be a very draconian measure in the first instance. Under the unamended drafting, the Bill would allow immediate penalties regardless of the scale or context of the offence committed. This is bad practice, contrary to the societal change that is needed if this legislation is to succeed.

Through these amendments, I want to enable enforcement authorities to apply sanctions gradually starting—this is important—with education and warnings for minor or first-time breaches. These would escalate only when non-compliance persists. This is a well-established approach of enforcement that is rooted in fairness. The goal of the Bill should be not to trap small retailers or inadvertent offenders in red tape but to encourage dialogue and corrective measures to be the mantra of our enforcement agencies. This is how you get change and compliance.

The tiered approach that I have outlined through Amendment 74 will build some much-needed credibility into the enforcement clauses of the Bill in a way that keeps the law tough when needed but ensures—this is important—that it is proportionate and, above all, fair. I beg to move the amendment.

[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.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

The noble Lord makes an interesting point. We will of course keep these matters under review. I will certainly look again at the impact assessment and at the point made by the noble Lord; I would be happy to write to him further, if needed, once I have had a look at all of that. On his specific point, we will keep an eye on the revenue, but, again— I am not sure that this is exactly the point that the noble Lord made; perhaps I can provide that bit of cover—in our earlier discussion, the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, and the noble Earl, Lord Howe, both acknowledged, as I did, that we are not seeking to get enough from fixed penalty notices to fund this. That is not our intention; in fact, we all hope that the revenue will decline as this Bill becomes increasingly successful in its impact. Let us also remember why we have this Bill: to introduce a smoke-free generation and drive down the demand for consumption. That changes the whole landscape. This is literally a generational change. So I hope that noble Lords will feel able not to press their amendments.

[Lord Udny-Lister (Con)]

I beg leave to withdraw Amendment 74.

Amendment 74 withdrawn.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Lord Udny-Lister Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 23rd April 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Udny-Lister (Con)]

My Lords, nobody in this House would ever dispute the virtues of creating a smoke-free generation and protecting public health, but the reality is that legislation, if we want it to be effective, has to be both practical and enforceable, and it is there that I have real difficulties with this Bill. In the short time I have, I will touch on just one area: the undue burden that is now going to be placed on local councils. We are going to create laws that are ultimately unenforceable and will inadvertently encourage illicit trading and limit our personal freedoms.

On enforcement, we know that trading standards, the police and licensing teams right across the UK are already under-resourced and overstretched. The notion that we can somehow police every corner shop in Britain—all 50,000 of them—and regulate every e-commerce website and cross-border shipment is farcical. Even if we accept the premise of this Bill, which I do not, the Government have yet to properly explain how they plan to adequately enforce it. I might add that the previous Bill, put forward by the Conservative Party, was little better on that point.

We know that when Governments seek to overregulate or ban products outright, if people want those products and are used to getting them, the demand is not eliminated simply by passing an Act. Instead, over- regulation pushes the trade underground, resulting in illicit trades and dangerous counterfeit products entering the market that pose even greater risks to public health than the blueberry vape that somebody wants to buy over the counter at their local convenience store. Who is going to fund the additional staff and resourcing that trading standards teams will require to enforce the clauses of this proposed legislation?

The pressure this Bill will place on local authorities concerns me, because the Government have failed to understand that our councils are already overstretched, thin on the ground and struggling with limited resources. The Bill requires councils to become the front line—the very coalface enforcers of a sprawling new licensing regime for tobacco and vaping products. Anybody with any experience of local authority licensing will tell you that councils are already struggling to cope with existing alcohol licensing. Due to funding and recruitment issues, not to mention severe backlogs in our magistrates’ courts, they are already unable to achieve this.

Do the Government realise that this legislation will require councils to monitor shops, issue licences, carry out inspections, support businesses with training, resolve disputes and take legal action against offenders? If the answer to that is yes, will the Minister explain to the House where this army of enforcement and licensing officers is going to come from and where the funding is? For years, as we have already heard from a previous speaker, the trading standards sector has been making the case that more needs to be done to encourage recruitment and training of new officers. After all, trading standards are currently responsible for enforcing over 300 laws. Given the new burdens placed on trading standards by this Bill, I would like to see the Government commit to investing in the training of qualified trading standards officers through a new and dedicated apprenticeship fund. We must not set up our councils to fail, as we are doing. In the interests of protecting local authorities and strengthening our trading standards teams, I will be seeking to amend the Bill as it progresses through your Lordships’ House.

I further fear that the Bill is a grave attack on personal freedom and liberty. Sadly, it represents another step in the creep of the nanny state. As it stands, the Bill erodes personal freedoms, makes life harder for small business owners and places undue burdens on local councils, all without addressing the root cause of vaping and tobacco use. If the Government are serious about creating a smoke-free generation, they should note that education and support work carried out by public health is the way forward, not prohibition.

Finally, is it really the Government’s intention to ignore the ancient principle of equality under the law? For if left unamended, the Bill will result in individuals born just a day apart having permanently different rights. I believe that the duty of Parliament, and indeed of this House, is to preserve equality under the law, and therefore I cannot support this.

Covid-19: Vaccinations for School Pupils

Lord Udny-Lister Excerpts

Monday 17th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Udny-Lister (Con)]

My Lords, can my noble friend the Minister update the House on what actions the Government have taken to protect school pupils and teaching staff from the reckless behaviour and damaging misinformation being propagated by anti-vax protesters?

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

My noble friend raises a very important point, which I know a number of other noble Lords have also raised. In a free society, we have to get the balance right between freedom of speech and ensuring that people have a right to say even those things with which we may disagree fundamentally, while ensuring that misinformation is not spread. The department has now provided information and guidance to schools on how to handle any misinformation, and who to contact if there are protests which step beyond the line of acceptability and contravene the law. The police now have comprehensive power to deal with the activities, especially those which spread hate or deliberately raise tensions through violence or public disorder. I am sure many people will be aware of the attacks on vaccination centres in Truro in October and in north Wales and at the Bromley Civic Centre earlier this month. That was going way too far on freedom of speech, and we want to make sure that we deal with the people who take part in these acts.

Covid-19 Update

Lord Udny-Lister Excerpts

Tuesday 6th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Udny-Lister (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate the Minister and the Government on taking this decisive decision to start getting the country back to normal, and in particular, to start getting the economy back to normal. Of course, this could not have been done without the success of the vaccine rollout. All that goes back to last March and April, when some very decisive decisions were made. The Prime Minister made it clear on a number of occasions that the way out would be vaccination.

I urge the Minister to go a little further and start getting the Government back into their offices in Whitehall and elsewhere and start helping those businesses which are so dependent upon our town centres—and, indeed, even this Whitehall area—to get them back together. I also urge him to start looking at the traffic light system, especially as Germany has now opened its borders to India. Now is the time to start trusting the vaccines.

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I completely concur with my noble friend’s analysis. This is an opportunity for the economy to bounce back, and I am really encouraged by everything I hear from the private sector in terms of the energy, enthusiasm and resilience of the UK economy. The large number of people who will be holidaying at home this summer provides one shot in the arm for the hospitality industry, which I know it is taking advantage of.

When it comes to borders, we have to be careful. One does not like to think about it, but the existence of millions and millions of people with the disease today means that the possibility of further variants has to be on the agenda. That is why we take it one step at a time, and I pay tribute to those in Border Force and the managed quarantine scheme for the work they have done. It is ironic that the variant delta, which started in India, is now so prevalent in the UK that it is possible to think about India coming off the red list. But there are variants elsewhere that we have to be wary of.

Hospital Waiting Lists

Lord Udny-Lister Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

The noble Baroness points very well to exactly the kind of challenge that we face at the moment. She is entirely right that conditions such as arthritis and rheumatology require complex combinations and collaboration between many different staff, as well as the application of new and effective treatments and therapies. That is exactly where we are working hard to catch up. I will go back to the apartment, dig out any statistics I can and write to her accordingly.

[Lord Udny-Lister (Con)]

My Lords, waiting lists were too long pre the pandemic and there are now some 6 million people awaiting treatment of one kind or another, many of them in a lot of pain and discomfort. The National Health Service has learned a lot during the pandemic. Will the Minister publish how he intends to speed up the treatment that these people need? Can he also advise whether he routinely uses his private email with his contacts?

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, the publication of NHS plans around the catch-up is happening on a regular basis, and there will indeed be further communication from the NHS on this. On the use of private email, I reassure noble Lords that I have read and signed the ministerial code and I seek to uphold it in everything I do.