Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 23rd April 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I well understand the good intentions of this Bill. The Government want to be seen to be doing something about public health rather than just talk. The last Government introduced a very similar Bill, but I am afraid that this very draconian Bill goes so much further. Very worryingly, it gives the Secretary of State huge powers to change things as they feel in the future, using delegated legislation. That is something that your Lordships will want to examine.

We all want fewer people to become addicted to smoking. I have never smoked. I had very well-intentioned parents who taught me very early on that smoking would not be good for my health. Most of all, I hated the smell in my clothes, as someone else has mentioned, after you had been in the company of a smoker. But no matter how good the intentions of this Bill, there are consequences that need addressing. I hope they will be addressed in Committee.

Like others, I had a meeting with the Federation of Independent Retailers. I was genuinely shocked to hear just how difficult its job already is in stopping those under the age of 18 buying tobacco. It has a genuine concern about the difficulties it will face in trying to assess the age of older people. There has been an increase in attacks on workers in small shops more recently. They face regular abuse and physical threats; ID checks already cause a lot of verbal abuse. The idea that our shop workers will bear the brunt of this new legislation seems very unfair. That is not even counting the extra costs of the proposed new licensing arrangements that, without doubt, will threaten the viability of some of our local family-run shops.

Despite what the noble Lord, Lord Stevens of Birmingham, said, I have yet to see any evidence that the Bill will not simply cause a growth in illicit trade, as was also mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Naseby. Even now, a large percentage of smokers will admit to purchasing tobacco from under-the-counter dealers or other underground places. The real winners from the Bill, if it goes through unamended, will be the organised crime gangs, which no doubt are already gearing up to benefit. They certainly could not care less about the age of anyone who is buying from them. I wonder whether the Government have thought through any strategy to deal with this.

Part 3 of the Bill, Clauses 68 to 87, deals with the changes to apply the Bill in Northern Ireland, which the noble Lords, Lord Dodds of Duncairn and Lord Naseby, have already spoken on. The European Union tobacco directive applies to Northern Ireland and, under the protocol through Section 7A of the 2018 Act and the directive, forbids the type of proposition in the Bill. I and many others, including many learned KCs, fail to see how the Bill can apply in Northern Ireland while the tobacco directive applies.

The Minister in the other place sought to dismiss this, but then the Government dismissed similar points on the legacy Bill, only to have the Northern Ireland High Court rule against, and now we are awaiting a hearing in the Supreme Court. The very welcome Supreme Court ruling last week on sex and gender has also raised concerns about whether that judgment can apply to Northern Ireland, as we are under EU law. The tobacco directive is one of some 288 other EU laws that, through Section 7A of the EU withdrawal Act, are applied as being superior law to UK law in Northern Ireland—law that we here in the UK Parliament cannot disapply. As has been mentioned, Denmark and the Republic of Ireland attempted to put through similar generational smoking bans but could not. There is no doubt that if this Bill goes through, the tobacco industry will judicially review whether it can apply to Northern Ireland. It will end up in the Supreme Court. I would be interested in the Minister’s response to see whether the rather head-in-the-sand approach taken in the other place has been changed, because this will certainly be an area where amendments will be tabled.

I am very pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Brady of Altrincham, raised something that I wanted to raise. Why are the Government turning a blind eye to police forces that are going soft on cannabis use in public and in private? Cannabis is an illegal drug. The stronger versions of it such as skunk are, according to research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience at King’s College, known to increase the risk of psychosis by three times compared with non-use. There is an increasing burden on our mental health services, and I see this as just as important a risk to health as tobacco. Does the Minister agree? What do the Government intend to do to deal with this?

Finally, I am concerned about the whole generational risk, as it has been put by other noble Lords, in differentiating in age between adults. One of the fundamental principles of a free society must be personal and family responsibility. The more that the Government ban and regulate, the less that families and people feel they have to make their own decisions. The state getting involved too much causes the influence of families, and individual responsibility, to be taken away. I hope that in Committee we can deal with these issues and get a better Bill to come out at the end; I think we all agree with its aim.