Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Walmsley Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 23rd April 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, this is a very important public health Bill, and for my own part I support it. Who among us would not, having heard the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Jopling?

Your Lordships will have heard some concerns expressed by colleagues on these Benches. I can therefore clarify that the environmental protection measures in the Bill are party policy, and all my colleagues will support them. However, there are some aspects of the Bill where colleagues have different views, which I respect but do not share, and on those we will have a free vote wherever necessary. I am on the side of my noble friend Lord Scriven’s fortunate twin, who was born a minute after midnight, because he could well live a longer and healthier life than his very slightly older sibling.

As we have heard, smoking is the biggest cause of preventable death. There is no safe way to use tobacco products, including when they are mixed with cannabis, so the legislation must cover all tobacco products. My noble friend Lady Northover, the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, and many others have pointed out that tobacco is unique because it kills two out of every three people who use it as directed, so serious measures are going to be needed to protect new generations. About 80% of smokers have tried to quit—as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, told us, it takes an average of 30 attempts to do so—and they need help. Vaping has proved to be the most successful aid to quitting smoking, which is why access to these devices must be protected for that purpose.

Smoking tobacco damages our economy. Yes, smokers pay tobacco taxes, but the cost to the NHS and in lost years of working life is much greater. We have heard some figures from my noble friends Lord Rennard and Lord Crisp and a number of other noble Lords. Why not therefore have a levy on these very profitable companies to pay for the measures recommended by my noble friend Lord Russell?

Smoking is an inequalities issue, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, and the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, emphasised. People on low incomes or living in areas of deprivation, or who have mental health issues, are more likely to smoke. Some 21% of pregnant women in the most deprived areas smoke, compared to only 5.6% in the least-deprived areas. The noble Baroness, Lady Rafferty, told us that this has contributed to the large differential in rates of stillbirth. We must take action on this, with more help for pregnant smokers to quit.

Smoking is not being banned or criminalised by the Bill; it just protects young people from becoming addicted to tobacco. People who already smoke will be able to continue to do so. Of course, this Bill will not help with poverty, except in the savings in smokers’ pockets if they quit, but it will reduce the number of people suffering ill health or early death through tobacco use. The purpose of the Bill is to avoid young people taking up smoking, because we know that nine in 10 smokers began before the age of 21. Adults who already smoke can continue to buy tobacco legally.

I welcome the announced increased funding for smoking cessation services, but would like to know if funding will go only to services that offer help to quit nicotine, as well as tobacco, as recommended by NICE. I congratulate the Government on reintroducing this Bill and the former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on setting the ball rolling. However, time is of the essence, because 35,000 18 to 25 year-olds have started smoking since the King’s Speech—so we need to get on with it.

Raising the legal age of sale incrementally is the best way to move towards a smoke-free generation, for two reasons. First, it will enable retailers to adjust gradually to the new regulations, by compensating for profits lost on tobacco products by introducing other products to their stock. Removing a one-year cohort at a time from the potential market will minimise the impact of this adjustment. I suppose that is why so many retailers support these measures. It is interesting to note that the retail margin on tobacco products is 8.5%, compared to around 21% on other products, while the tobacco manufacturers make 50%. I agree with the introduction of licensing to sell tobacco and vapes, but would like to know what sort of burden the application process will put on small retailers. What about the rest of the supply chain? Should not importers and wholesalers also be licensed?

Secondly, the gradual implementation answers the claim from the tobacco companies that the Bill will encourage the illicit market—well, they would say that, would they not? A single-year cohort of potential smokers does not introduce a vast new market for illicit traders to prey upon. The numbers are small, and the Minister may know how small. Previous legislative measures did not increase illicit sales because of effective enforcement, and those enforcement measures have recently had some considerable successes. However, adequate funding for Border Force and local trading standards continues to be vital, as the noble Lord, Lord Bichard, said. Will the Government monitor the adequacy of this funding as things progress?

Some of my colleagues are concerned that the Bill restricts the freedom of adults to buy a legal product, and that the way in which it is done would allow one 37 year-old to buy tobacco while another, whose birthday was a month later, could not. I will leave it to the Minister to explain why a particular birth date was chosen, rather than a particular age. My personal view is that, once people are hooked on nicotine, they are no longer free to choose because it is so highly addictive. That is why it is so important that they should not take it up in the first place. Most people who smoke regret having started, and many of them try hard to give up. I quote Professor Chris Whitty, who stated:

“I’ve seen many people in hospital desperate to stop … yet they cannot—their choice has been removed”.


Nicotine takes away their freedom. That is why it is so important to stop people taking it up in the first place and to disincentivise taking up nicotine-containing vapes, except as a quitting aid.

Some say that age verification may raise the spectre of ID cards, which my party and I are very much against. However, most young people are already quite used to having to show ID when buying a beer or cigarettes, and small retailers often ask for it. I was asked for ID this week when collecting a parcel from the Post Office and taking rubbish to the local tip. I think that extending the range of products for which age verification is required is a small price to pay for eliminating this dangerous and costly product within a generation.

Some suggest that we could achieve the same objective through education, public information and smoking cessation services, but we have found that government action works better. Since the indoor smoking ban and advertising restrictions, young people now smoke at half the rate of their parents’ generation. However, we must not let up on education about the dangers of smoking and indeed vaping, especially since there is evidence that refillable vapes are being spiked with spice or cannabis.

As mentioned by the noble Baronesses, Lady Grey-Thompson and Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, the noble Earl, Lord Russell, and others, some smokers believe that filter cigarettes give some protection from the harms of tobacco, but of course they have no health benefit at all and may give a false sense that they do. However, filters do have an environmental impact as many are made of plastic that does not decompose, and even the biodegradable ones take a long time to rot down and can pollute our rivers. There is therefore a strong case for banning cigarette filters on environmental grounds.

There has been an exponential rise in young people vaping, and the Bill gives Ministers the power to regulate vapes without presenting a barrier to smokers using vapes to quit. Vapes are relatively new, so the effects of long-term use are unknown, although the fact that it is illegal to sell vapes to children is because there is some evidence of negative effects of inhaling vaping products on the developing lungs and brain. However, although vapes may be less harmful than smoking, the purpose of the Bill is to discourage non-smokers from taking up vaping. The nicotine in vapes is just as addictive as that in cigarettes and, as the noble Lord, Lord Rook, told us, some schools are reporting concerning effects on children who are managing to get hold of them. As Professor Chris Whitty says,

“if you don’t smoke, don’t vape”.

Once you start, they have got you—like any other addiction—and that is why the tobacco companies have turned to vapes to protect their profits.

On the powers for Ministers to regulate aspects of vapes such as flavours, colours, advertising and packaging, I say that the industry has cynically targeted children—as the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, showed us very graphically —with brightly coloured packaging and flavours that are attractive to children. The powers to stop this are welcome, but the Government must engage with young people, and existing smokers who want to quit, to make the regulations successful. As the noble Baroness, Lady Mattinson, said, we need to make vapes really boring and unattractive.

On the powers to extend the smoking and vaping ban to new outdoor areas, I say that if you can smell smoke, you are inhaling it. That reduces your freedom to breathe clean air, and nobody has given you any choice. However, I would like assurance that before this power is used there will be serious consultation to establish whether there is really any harm to non-smokers. There must be evidence of harm.

Prevention of one of the major causes of illness is better and cheaper than cure. We have to plug the hole in the leaky bucket of public money by stopping preventable diseases wherever we can, and that includes action on bad food and obesity. Do we want to pay higher taxes to pay for the NHS to treat more generations made ill by tobacco dependency? That is what the tobacco and vape manufacturers would like us to do. I encourage the Government to stand up to them.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Walmsley Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 27th October 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, I want to add a brief footnote to the excellent speeches from my noble friends Lord Bourne and Lord Bethell. This group of amendments is probably the most important one that confronts this Committee because it challenges a major plank underpinning the Government’s approach to this by challenging the generational ban. It is appropriate that this group contains not just the first of the marshalled amendments but the last.

A long time ago, I held the position of the Minister as a Health Minister. From 1979 to 1981, I was in charge of the negotiations with the tobacco industry—the Tobacco Advisory Council as it then was—and I adopted a fairly aggressive negotiation tactic. When I suggested that the health warnings should not be just on the packets but the cigarettes, they told me I could not do this as the ink was carcinogenic. In 1981, my tactics proved a little too much for the then Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, who moved me to a less confrontational position on that issue.

I have listened with respect to the arguments made by my noble friends in favour of Amendment 1, which would basically substitute the generational ban with a ban for anyone under 21. As my noble friend Lord Howe said on Second Reading, these issues involve a balance between personal freedoms on one hand and health gain on the other, a point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox. Noble Lords may come down on different sides of the argument in free vote territory, but it seems to me the weakness of the amendment is simply its lack of ambition. It does not appear to bring to an end the harm done by the tobacco industry which is the whole point of the generational ban. As the former Prime Minister said last week, it was one of his proudest initiatives of those he introduced when he was Prime Minister.

It is worth just reminding your Lordships that the Bill passed the other place twice, once with a majority of 415 to 47. Last year, when my party was in government and had a free vote, I noted that the vast majority of Conservative MPs voted for the Bill, with just 67 voting against, and only two members of the Cabinet of about 30 voted against. So I hope that the broad policy introduced by the previous Government will continue to be carried through by this one and that a free vote will be allowed on my side for those who take a different view. I also recognise that the Bill is actually a little different from the one that was introduced last year.

This amendment would indeed reduce the harm done by smoking, but the Government’s own assessment concludes that a generational ban promises a far greater effect on smoking prevalence and broader support among young people. We should not want a smaller scale of ambition for a product that has killed a million people in this country over the last 50 years. The increase in the age of sale was a bit of policy conceived on evidence and based on long-term public health reform. It has strong public support, and it is backed by experts.

As the noble Lord, Lord Bichard, said, this does not impact current smokers. The impact on personal freedom is less under the Government’s proposal than under the amendment. The rewards from this are substantial: fewer young people taking up smoking, fewer families suffering avoidable disease and loss, and a future in which our economy and NHS are no longer burdened by the toll from tobacco.

I will say a quick word about the black market. I can do no better than to quote what Victoria Atkins said when this point was raised when she introduced nearly the same Bill last year. On the point about

“the age of sale and the black market, tobacco industry representatives claim that there will be unintended consequences from raising the age of sale. They assert that the black market will boom. Before the smoking age was increased from 16 to 18, they sang from the same hymn sheet, but the facts showed otherwise. The number of illicit cigarettes consumed fell by 25%, and smoking rates for 16 and 17-year-olds dropped by almost a third”.—[Official Report, Commons, 16/4/24; col. 188.]

So I recognise the concerns of some of my noble friends on the libertarian wing of my party, but I remind them that crash helmets were made compulsory under the Heath Government in 1973; seatbelts became compulsory for drivers under the Thatcher Government in 1983 and for all passengers in 1981 under John Major. The previous Conservative Government introduced the Health and Care Act, which unblocked progress in adding fluoride to the water supply to promote dental health. So the generational ban is consistent with my party’s approach to public health over the last 50 years and I hope it will be sustained in this Parliament.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I just make a few points that have been raised in the debate. Noble Lords will soon find out that I do not take the same view as my noble friend Lord Scriven; I take the same view as my noble friend Lady Northover. Some of the aspects of this Bill are indeed a free vote for my party.

In this group of amendments, the noble Lord, Lord Murray, intends to remove the generational element. However, as the noble Lords, Lord Bichard and Lord Young, have just mentioned, this is not prohibition for those already addicted to tobacco. In fact, the reason why the generational ban and the way that it works through is a good idea is because it is considerate to people who are already addicted to tobacco. It allows them to have plenty of time to quit if they so wish—the fact is that most of them do, but many find it very difficult. Retailers have been mentioned. The same thing applies to retailers: this gives them an opportunity to gradually adjust their business plan as demand falls. This is a good way of doing it for them as well. Taxation has been mentioned. Of course, taxation on tobacco does not nearly cover the damage that it does, but we will come to “polluter pays” later.

The noble Lord, Lord Murray, has been shouting fire about the illicit market but, on the illicit market, the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, and I have some helpful amendments that we will discuss in a later group, which may help. As the noble Baroness, Lady Carberry, said, the central point of the powers that the Government are taking is to stop people starting in the first place and thereby reduce the market, both legal and illicit. Sadly, the Government have taken so long to bring this before us in Committee that 120,000 young people have started smoking since the Bill was first introduced. Something must be done. It is, as the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, said, a public health crisis.

My noble friend Lord Scriven talked about the difficulty where you have two people who are very close in age but have different rights of choice. However, if you move the age limit to 21, you have the same problem with the 20 year-old and the 22 year-old. Really, it does not make any difference to that point. A very small choice restriction on one person’s freedom of choice is for the greater good and their own good.

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[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, we were talking about the issue of one person almost the same age as another person having less freedom of choice. The point is that once you are addicted to nicotine, your freedom of choice is extremely limited, as we have just heard from my noble friend Lady Northover. She gave the example of her nephew, who found it extremely difficult to give up. My late mother-in-law was in the same position. She tried to give up smoking until she died—and she died of smoking, sadly.

It is very important that we have a robust system of enforcement. I look forward to hearing the Minister telling us about it, and what future measures the Government might take to reduce the number of illicit cigarettes—although I am told that it has declined by about 90% since 2000. One or two noble Lords mentioned the case in Australia. The fact is that it was a lack of robust enforcement that caused the problem in Australia. Despite that, the amount of people smoking has indeed gone down—but I agree with noble Lords who say that we need strong enforcement. When it comes to a smoker who, let us say, is my age, or who will be my age in many years’ time, who needs to provide some kind of ID, as long as it is not absolutely mandated, I am sure that some form of ID will be devised by clever people for those aged 82, and it will not be very difficult for them; they will just be able to do it, and that will sort that problem out altogether.

As noble Lords might have gathered, I support the Government’s generational approach to reaching the point of a smoke-free Britain. It is a public health crisis, as is obesity, on which the Government also need to take action. Lots of amendments are coming up about various aspects that have been mentioned today, such as age-gating, which we will discuss in greater detail. This has been a very extensive and passionate debate. I must say that I find myself a little surprised that so many of former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s party are so against what the Government are trying to do achieve his ambition. However, I shall leave it at that.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Murray for bringing forward the amendments in his name, because he has allowed us to begin this Committee by engaging with one of the central and, dare I say, most controversial pillars of this Bill: the generational smoking ban. It is fitting that we start with this big policy issue, because the clause goes to the very heart of what the Government are seeking to do in creating what they describe as a smoke-free generation.

Before I turn to the points made in the debate, it is worth reminding ourselves of the context in which we are discussing the Bill—and a number of noble Lords have underlined that context. Smoking remains the single biggest entirely preventable cause of illness, disability and death in our country. It kills some 80,000 people each year. It costs our NHS and social care systems more than £3 billion annually. Someone is admitted to hospital because of smoking almost every minute. It shortens lives, it devastates families, and it deepens inequality. Yet, as we debate this issue, we can recognise that, happily, the direction of travel is positive. Smoking rates have been falling: in 1990, nearly one in three adults smoked, but, today, that figure stands at just above one in 10. The number of children who smoke is falling as well.

Those are not arguments for complacency or for not legislating, but nor are they arguments for legislating carelessly. My noble friend Lord Murray asked some pertinent questions for the Minister to answer, in particular on the Windsor Framework and the dangers of a burgeoning illicit market, but, more generally, he was surely right to challenge the Government to explain exactly how the generational ban will operate. I say that he is right, because the proposal will represent a profound shift in how the law treats adults. It will, for the first time, make a permanent legal distinction between two adults, based solely on their dates of birth. One person aged 35, say, will be permitted to buy a legal product, while another person aged 34 will put a tobacconist in criminal jeopardy for selling him precisely the same product.

I emphasise that I pay tribute to my right honourable friend the former Prime Minister. Nevertheless, serious practical questions arise from that distinction, quite apart from the questions around discrimination throughout this Bill, to which we need—I say this to the Minister—to face up. Some of those questions have already been foreshadowed by my noble friends Lord Murray and Lord Moylan but, as a starter, let me pick up the question of enforcement, which came up in the contribution from the noble Lord, Lord Scriven. How exactly do the Government intend these measures to be policed? How much responsibility will fall on shopkeepers, how much on trading standards and how much on the police?

Then there is the impact on retailers. How will small and independent retailers be supported to implement the new age checks and avoid inadvertent breaches of the law? Are we just going to leave them to cope as best as they can? Importantly, there is also the question of public understanding. How will the Government communicate to the public, especially younger adults, that some people of more or less the same age may face entirely different legal restrictions?

Can the Minister confirm one point of detail, which we discussed in our meetings on the Bill ahead of Committee? Will a person born on or after 1 January 2009 be permitted to sell tobacco products to someone born before that date? In other words, will someone who is themselves legally prohibited from purchasing tobacco still be able to serve or sell such products to others who remain entitled to buy them? That may seem a minor question, but it is one of the many practical questions that shopkeepers and retailers are already asking. The answer will affect staffing and hiring practices. What age will an employee of a tobacconist have to be to handle tobacco sales? Those are not arguments against the generational ban, but I hope that the Minister can address these concerns in her reply.

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[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendments proposed by my noble friend Lord Moylan on having the affirmative resolution procedure for statutory instruments. That seems wholly sensible.

On age verification, I strongly support the amendment proposed by my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham. Dealing with online sales is a real issue. We have the overseas experience of countries such as France, Mexico, Brazil and so on to look at, but this seems a neat solution to what could otherwise become a very real problem.

On the amendment proposed by my noble friend Lord Lansley, considerable work has been done on age gating in relation to vaping sales and, as he said, those who are vaping strongly support having some kind of process. We have the system being developed by IKE Tech in the USA, currently awaiting FDA approval, which provides a very neat and quick method of age verification via a smartphone app. It will enable adults to remain protected—it will take them only 90 seconds for the initial process and six seconds for every subsequent vape, so it will not take long. That seems a very sensible way of proceeding and I am interested to hear what the Minister has to say on that.

In relation to what the noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, and the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, said about what the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, would have said, there is certainly an issue to be looked at. I strongly support looking at what has been working in Scotland. It seems sensible to look at what they have been doing, learn from their experience and follow it where appropriate. Again, I will be interested to hear what the Minister has to say on that issue.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I do not think it is fair to ask a courier driver to verify the age of a person, so the noble Lord, Lord Young, has a very good point, and age verification online is very poor. The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, spoke about age gating. I can see why it is popular with retailers, because it would take some of the burden away from them.

It has been claimed that the Bill may not currently keep up with technology. Can the Minister say whether the wide powers in the Bill would allow powers to be taken in future to mandate age-gating technology if the evidence indicates that it is needed? Clearly, there is a problem even now with underage children buying vapes. A briefing that I—and I think quite a few other noble Lords—received from something called IKE Tech said that 71% of underage children buying vapes get them from retailers. That indicates that we need a really vigorous enforcement regime. It also said that 76% said they are buying them online, which indicates support for the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Young.

On the whole, when people buy from a retailer, I think that I am in favour of a wide range of means of age verification being acceptable. Both these amendments aim to reduce opportunities to start vaping underage, which is a very good thing, because young people who start vaping may not be killed by tobacco but they will be made addicted and very poor by the addiction to nicotine that they will get hooked on. I look forward to the Minister’s reply on that. I would not want to prevent an adult who could not obtain digital age verification buying an effective quitting tool, so we have to be a bit careful about unexpected consequences.

One thing that I saw in the briefing was interesting. The claim is that similar tech can also prevent circulation of illicit products by embedding low-cost NFC tags into product packaging so that every legal vape can be instantly verified; this stops fakes at the border and on shop shelves. That is something that we should all be concerned about, because drugs could well be inserted into vapes—and I understand that this is happening already—so people are getting things that they do not expect to get. Of course, something like that would not be legal and, if there was a tag on them to identify anything that is legal, you would only want to buy those. I know that teachers have reported problems with children being drugged by things that have been inserted into vapes, so that is something that we should consider.

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[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I am not going to say much about Amendment 4. I think that, if this Bill is effective, there will not be many people still left smoking by 2040—I certainly hope not—but I do worry a bit about the poor old chap of 95 who has somehow managed to avoid the bullet of lung cancer and all the other health problems but started smoking when he was in the Army and simply cannot give up.

Leaving all that aside, as your Lordships know, I welcome the Government’s plan for us to become a smoke-free country. I believe that that is achievable, but we must go further and faster than we have ever gone before; that is what we are doing. Such a plan will require a comprehensive, integrated, monitored and enforced strategy—hence the need for a road map, as proposed in Amendment 193 by the noble Lord, Lord Young, my noble friend Lady Northover and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson.

It is true that smoking rates have declined by two-thirds over the last half century while smoking inequalities have grown, but, at the current rate of decline, we will miss the Government’s target and the poorest in society will suffer most. We will achieve a smoke-free Britain only by motivating more smokers to quit using the most effective quitting aids, while reducing the number of children and young adults who start smoking each year.

The evidence on which policy levers work is quite clear, but what is needed is for the Government both to pull them together to their fullest extent and to report on them. This will require targets, monitoring, enforcement and investment, but the investment required for education and smoking cessation services can be counted in millions of pounds as compared with the billions of pounds that it costs us to treat smoking-related diseases and in lost productivity caused by smoking-related disability. The benefits will far outweigh the costs.

As I say, there are big inequality issues in this smoking situation. Smoking drives more than 1 million people, including many children, into poverty by leeching money out of their pockets and out of the local economy. Indeed, only a tiny proportion of the spending on tobacco stays in local communities; most of it goes up in smoke, in taxes or in tobacco manufacturers’ profits. We will probably come on to that next time.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Baroness Walmsley Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 30th October 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (Con)]

My Lords, in support of the speech we have just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, there is ample evidence of successful earlier levies, contrary to what the noble Baroness suggested. They include levies on landfill and soft drinks as well as provisions following Grenfell, as my noble friend said. In the gambling industry, there is also a very successful levy. Nor is it a unique matter to require companies to publish data, with the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, correctly naming water and energy as two examples.

I can quite see why the Minister is attracted to the idea of the levy. In this hard-pressed time, we have hard-pressed taxpayers about to be even more hard pressed; they should not have to pay for the gap in public resources for public health. Nevertheless, there is a gap in the public health budget that needs to be filled—and this will fill it. I can therefore see why the Minister is attracted to it. There is also of course the incalculable harm that is caused by the industry—whether one calls it evil or not. As the noble Baroness mentioned, two-thirds of people who smoke will ultimately die from it—that to me can be characterised as evil. It certainly causes harm, and that harm needs to be dealt with.

So I strongly support this group of amendments. Amendment 12 in the name of the noble Baronesses, Lady Walmsley and Lady Northover, and Amendment 148 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, concern publishing data. They seem eminently sensible. However, my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham’s amendment would provide a means of getting the polluter to pay. That is something we should seek to do because, as noble as the aims of this legislation are, there is a big gap in spending. I do not see why the taxpayer should have to pay for this, but I can quite see why the industry should; I hope, therefore, to hear from the Minister that that is going to happen.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, on behalf of our Benches, I have added my name to my noble friend Lady Northover’s Amendment 12. I also support Amendment 148, of course, although my name is not on it yet; I have a bit of a track record on changing “may” to “must”, so I am very much in favour of that amendment.

As my noble friend said, the tobacco industry sits on a rich source of data that would help public health planners and practitioners to plan and deliver public health smoking cessation services in a granular way. That could help to reduce inequalities, so my noble friend’s Amendments 12 and 148 are no-brainers for the Government in the fight against health inequality, which I know they are in favour of winning. As the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, pointed out, if you have the data, you have a powerful weapon; the industry uses it and the Government should have it.

The data would also shine a light on the massive profits of the tobacco companies, which saw the writing on the wall about the decline of tobacco smoking and shifted part of their business model to hooking young people and existing smokers into being addicted to their nicotine vaping products instead. They then surrounded them with brightly coloured packaging, attractive-sounding flavours and masses of expensive advertising. One has to wonder why they spend so much money on advertising and the attractive displays in my local village shops. Ah, yes—it must be because that enables them to hook people to their profitable products for life.

These profits are addressed in Amendment 192 from the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, which is supported by my noble friends Lord Rennard and Lady Finlay of Llandaff, and in my noble friend Lord Russell’s Amendment 194, which I also support. Both amendments propose a levy on the profits of tobacco companies. Tobacco and the nicotine it contains are uniquely harmful products, which is why they should be treated in this way. They are highly addictive for some people from their very first use, by the way; that is sometimes ignored. Tobacco kills more than 76,000 people in England every year—that is almost as many as were killed by Covid in just one year, in 2020—and the four manufacturers that are responsible for most of the UK’s tobacco sales make excessive profits that require regulation. It has been said that they make an estimated profit of £900 million a year in the UK, with an average net operating profit margin of about 50%; as my noble friend Lord Scriven pointed out, most manufacturers of other goods are quite satisfied with an average of 10%. Yet those companies currently pay very little corporation tax in the UK. The tobacco tax of £6.8 billion that they pay does not even scratch the surface of the harm they do; as has been pointed out, that tax is paid by the consumer and not by the producer.

In other areas of society, polluters are required to avoid and minimise pollution and to pay to clean it up. Tobacco companies make no effort to do either. In other monopoly situations, such as energy supply, the Government intervene, yet tobacco companies get away scot free, despite the fact that their products cost the NHS £1.82 billion annually and the ill health caused by them causes major suffering to individuals and families; they also have a major effect on productivity and the economy, costing society in England £43.7 billion a year.

Given this Government’s objectives on growth, I would have thought that a “polluter pays” tobacco levy would be very popular with them, as it is with the general public, 76% of whom support the policy. It could raise up to £700 million per year to fund vital smoking cessation and wider public health activities, as my noble friend Lord Russell suggests in his amendment. It could prevent industry manipulating prices to undermine the health aims of tobacco taxes. A levy would make tobacco less profitable in the UK and reduce industry incentives to lobby against government actions to achieve a smoke-free country. I know that they are very clever lobbyists. Although I trust that this Government will resist such lobbying, this would ensure that the cost burden of taxes is not shifted to consumers because a levy alongside a cap on manufacturer pricing would prevent manufacturers passing the costs on to consumers.

Smoking remains the leading cause of preventable death in the UK, alongside obesity caused by poor diet. Investing in the resources raised by the levy to help smokers quit, as in Amendment 194, will support the Government’s ambitions to halve the difference in healthy life expectancy and shift healthcare from treatment to prevention, an ambition outlined strongly in the Government’s 10-year health plan.

These amendments are very much in line with what the Government want. I hope that they will have the courage to accept them. The key principle is that the revenue to tackle the harms of tobacco should come from the industry, not the poor, addicted and often sick consumer, and the cost of the damage caused by tobacco should certainly not come from the taxpayer.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, this group of amendments addresses common themes: the regulation of the tobacco industry, its profits and its reporting obligations. Collectively, these raise important questions about transparency, fairness, proportionality and the limits of state intervention.

Beginning with Amendments 12 and 148, tabled by the noble Baronesses, Lady Northover and Lady Walmsley, these concern the provision and publication of information by tobacco manufacturers and importers. We recognise the intent behind these amendments: to improve the quality and availability of data so that public health policy can be better informed. Data, transparency and evidence-based policy-making are essential to an effective tobacco control strategy. However, would these amendments enable us to achieve that? Requiring every manufacturer and importer to publish detailed quarterly sales data broken down by product type, brand and region would give us more information, but how useful would it be? The Department of Health and Social Care and the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities already have access to significant data from HMRC such as market surveys and other reporting systems. The question usefully begged by this amendment is whether there are any gaps in that data that could usefully be filled.

This brings me to Amendment 148, also tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, which seeks to change Clause 95 so that the Secretary of State “must” rather than “may” make regulations requiring producers and importers to provide information about their products. I would like an answer to my earlier question before I jump one way or the other on that amendment. I appreciate the spirit in which she has tabled it. Having more data would certainly be useful, but we need to know exactly what data before we compel companies across the board to do one thing or another. It is generally better to provide Ministers with flexibility, allowing them to act where there is a clear and proportionate need, without imposing automatic or universal obligations on every business regardless of its size or nature.

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[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

The noble Lord will be glad to know that I am reminded of what I should know already: matters in relation to the dates for Third Reading are matters for business managers. It will also depend on how much progress we make.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

I ask for a brief clarification. Is the Minister claiming that Amendment 12 is not necessary because she will accept Amendment 148?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

No, that is not the case. I urge the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, to withdraw her amendment.

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[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I have a great sympathy for this group of amendments introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Kamall. There should be a limit on the strength of nicotine products which are legally for sale. Some of those products are clearly, from what we have heard from other noble Lords, very dangerous to both physical and mental health. The evidence is emerging on that.

Limiting the strength of something is not a new idea. Strength limits and price controls have been put on various alcoholic drinks, such as white cider, which has been particularly responsible for problem drinking. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, I am concerned about nicotine pouches and young people, because their packaging and flavours make them look like sweets, making them appear very attractive to children. I accept that only a small percentage of tobacco product users buy this form of tobacco product, but a high proportion of those users are young people.

There is not much evidence yet of the effectiveness of such pouches as a smoking quitting tool; they are nowhere near as effective as nicotine patches or vapes. Apparently, only about 3% of quitting efforts are based on them. In fact, you do not need a high concentration for these things to work; nicotine patches work for many users, and they are not particularly strong. However, there are clear dangers with these very strong products. Perhaps this is an area where we need further evidence, so can the Minister say whether it will be covered in the Government’s recent call for further evidence on measures in the Bill? Before we go forward to the next stage, perhaps we could get the results of that consultation.

[Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Blake of Leeds) (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords for raising these points and for bringing forward the amendments to Committee today. Listening to Finn’s story from the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, it is important that we always bear in mind that we are talking about real young people and children and the actual harms that can come to them.

Amendments 13, 14, 15, 139 and 140 seek to introduce a ban on manufacture, sale and possession with intent to supply high-strength oral nicotine products, specifically those containing more than 20 milligrams of nicotine per portion. I say from the outset that we are sympathetic to noble Lords trying to define the correct and safe nicotine level of a nicotine pouch—we need to address that. As we have heard, unlike with nicotine vapes, there is currently no set nicotine limit for nicotine pouches, and nicotine strengths can be as high as 150 milligrams, with the harm that goes with that. There is also significant variation in these strengths internationally.

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[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

The noble Baroness destroys her own argument by saying that nightclubs are premises where young people go for recreation and then saying that they might use the vaping machines and start vaping. The last thing we want is for young people, who do not want to smoke, to start vaping because they are in a recreational atmosphere where other people are vaping and there is an opportunity for them to join in. I repeat the point that I see vaping as a smoking-cessation tool, not a recreational exercise.

Finally, while I am normally on the same page as the noble Earl, Lord Russell, on this, I find his argument—that we need to fix a price that is so high that it is out of the reach of young people with pocket money, but so low that we do not penalise those in poor communities where smoking is prevalent—to be an impossible circle to square. He indicated some flexibility, but flexibility does not solve the problem, because the easier we make it for the smoking communities to start vaping, the easier it is for young people. I am not sure that price control is an area that is going to solve the problem, but I accept the environmental consequences that he spoke so fluently about.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak first to the amendments from my noble friends. My noble friend Lord Russell and I laid Amendment 21 to probe the issue of the affordability of vapes for young people. Currently, the evidence of the number of young people below the legal age of 18 accessing vapes indicates that they are currently affordable. Not all young people are getting them on the black market, because about half of them state in surveys that they get them from a shop. This certainly raises the question of why retailers are selling vapes to young people without proof of age.

It also raises the role of price. Minimum pricing is a mechanism that has been used for public health reasons to increase the price of alcohol and decrease the amount that people buy. Why do we not take the same approach for vapes? Besides, as I understand it, if the price of vapes is seen as a barrier to quitting, a patient can have them prescribed to them by a doctor. Is that true? Perhaps the Minister will clarify that later.

We want to use this Bill to protect the use of vapes as an effective tool for quitting smoking. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, that I do not think there is any contradiction between that and wanting to protect young people from taking up vaping, especially as it sometimes leads to smoking tobacco as well.

We are aware that a vape liquid excise duty will come in next October, which will increase the price of vapes. A smoker who wants to use vapes as a quitting tool will not be deterred from buying vapes if they continue to be cheaper than cigarettes because clearly they can afford cigarettes, so of course they can also afford vapes. Can the Minister reassure us that the concurrent increase in the tax on tobacco will maintain that gap and keep tobacco more expensive than vapes? Do the Government have any granular research on the effect of the price of these products as a deterrent?

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[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

The noble Earl, Lord Russell, is good at advertising the product that he is promoting. If anyone is interested in doing PR on anything, this is your man.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 22 in my name and those of my noble friend Lord Russell and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. As my noble friend said, it seeks to prohibit pre-filled single-use vaping pods, mainly for environmental reasons. These things have been the tobacco industry’s response to—indeed, its pre-emption of—the ban on single-use vapes that was introduced in June this year. Single-use vapes were such an effective entry point into vaping for young people and such a terrible blight on the environment.

These liquid pods are single-use vapes by another name. Just because you have to insert the pod does not mean that this is a multi-use product. They are cheap and available and have turned out to be just as bad for the environment as the single-use ones were, for all the reasons outlined by my noble friend. Indeed, they have introduced a new litter problem, which is that the removable sticker from the liquid container is appearing everywhere, stuck on to waste bins and pavement furniture after people have peeled them off to insert the pods. Local authorities have to spend time removing those, as well as the discarded vapes. They are just as much of a litter hazard as their predecessors were. Perhaps the Minister will tell us why they should not be treated in the same way as the original single-use vapes.

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, that the industry has only itself to blame for the ban on single-use vapes, because it used them, via its egregious marketing, to attract young people to addictive nicotine products. So the Government were quite right to ban them.

The problem with Amendment 145 is that single-use vapes were immediately replaced by the devices we are talking about in this group. There is no point reviewing the effect of the ban on the original single-use vapes alone, because they are all mixed up with the emergence of these products at pretty much the same time. A review would only cause a delay to the introduction, by this Bill, of measures to reduce youth smoking and vaping and to assist smokers to quit—which is an objective to which everybody who I have heard speak so far is committed.

[Baroness Carberry of Muswell Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, I had prepared a whole speech opposing Amendment 145, but I have now abandoned it, because the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, made my points for me.

Before I make some observations on that, I take this opportunity to say that, on the first day in Committee, I spoke to an amendment in the first group, but I had to leave before my noble friend the Minister responded. Therefore, I take this opportunity to apologise to the Committee and to my noble friend the Minister for that discourtesy.

The reason I am now slightly perplexed about the intention of the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, is that her amendment purports to seek a report and an extra process before the regulations on content and flavour can be introduced. However, as we heard from the noble Baroness, we already know the effects of the ban on single-use vapes: as was widely predicted, trying to ban those products had very limited success in attaining the Government’s environmental and health goals. As has already been said, we can plainly see how the ban has failed every time we walk down our high streets and see very similar products available—I suspect that most people who use vapes cannot tell the difference between them. I put it to the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, that the report, review and consultation that she seeks have already been answered by what we can see every time we go to the supermarket.

I wonder why, in her view, it will be necessary to hold up the regulations in the way that is proposed. Surely, given the extent of the apparent consensus among Members in Committee that we would like to see youth vaping greatly reduced because of the harm it brings, we would want to see regulations not held up unnecessarily. Obviously, we want the Government to proceed carefully and introduce legislation that will be effective and reach its objectives efficiently, but we have to get on with it and not introduce delays and barriers where they are not necessary. I would be very grateful if the noble Baroness could clarify that.

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[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I am pleased to see this group of excellent amendments. They have been so well explained and motivated that I do not need to add very much more.

I support them for a couple of reasons. In my dealings with different groups of people who represent convenience stores—shopkeepers—they have made it clear that they do not feel that they have been consulted at all. Ironically, the quotes always come from the British Retail Consortium. I have nothing against the British Retail Consortium—it has said some interesting things on the Bill—but shopkeepers feel that there are specific issues that are not being picked up, particularly around convenience stores.

Convenience stores are often a community asset; they are part of the community. I know that the Government understand this, because they are bringing in a new law—although I do not know whether it is necessary—to protect retail workers from assault. As I pointed out in the debate on that Bill, I hope that we already have a law protecting retail workers from assault, but it would be a double whammy if we have two. This indicates that the Government care about retail workers. Part of the motivation for that was the increase in assaults and violence. However, people from those different organisations have contacted me because of my Second Reading speech, where I made similar points. They have pointed out that they are most worried about the age verification that will come with the generational smoking ban and the economic hit that will come from the regulations that will come in with this Bill. These are some of their big fears.

When we talk about cost-benefit analysis and really weigh up what matters, we keep saying, “Health, health”, or “Public health, public health”, but let me tell you that, if you are running a small convenience store, a different thing can affect your health, and that is worrying that you will go under because of new laws and changes. So consultation with the wider group is very important.

I also want to back up the point about the peculiar position on manufacturers. We have constantly heard about everything being big tobacco, which I know is an easy way to close down a debate. I do not actually think that it would be wrong to talk to those manufacturers, but there are lots of manufacturers involved in lots of different products that will be affected by this Bill. We cannot just write them all off as “big tobacco”. Having that nuance is something on which I hope the Minister and the Government will listen.

The most important amendment of all, though, is Amendment 150 because it stresses that this consultation is not to be just a box-ticking exercise. It would insert the words,

“and take into consideration the views of”—

words that the Minister should welcome, because a consultation must listen properly. You must take into consideration the views of the people you are consulting and not have just a box-ticking exercise. I would like a broader range of organisations to be consulted; I would also like the Minister and the Government to listen to them when they are consulted.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, as I understand it, following the Royal Assent of this Bill, there will be more consultations on many of the regulations the Government plan to bring forward. The call for evidence, which was published on 8 October, is already seeking evidence on some of the more technical aspects of the Bill.

I point out to those who tabled these amendments that the UK Government are a signatory to Article 5.3 of the WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which aims to protect health policy-making from tobacco industry influence. That is why I think that there should be no further mandation for consultation with those who have a vested interest in producing or selling tobacco products, as long as we keep an eye on small retailers. As far as the bulk of their sales of products containing tobacco—I choose the way I express it very carefully—are concerned, there will be a small impact because only a one-year cohort at a time, which is a relatively small amount, will be prevented from being sold these products. As I said on our previous day in Committee, that will give small retailers plenty of time to adjust their sales models. We will deal with things such as age verification, as well as other issues that may cause small retailers concern, in our debates on other groups; we must do that rigorously.

I point out that there is nothing to stop tobacco companies responding to past and current government consultations on proposed regulations, but, of course, all respondents are required under the WHO convention to be transparent about their direct or indirect industry links. This is appropriate given their commercial conflicts of interest, which are sometimes in direct conflict with the Government’s public health objective to eliminate smoking over a generation.

[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful for these amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Kamall. Amendments 26, 27, 31, 56, 111, 150 to 153 and 213 seek to ensure that the views of consumers, businesses and retailers are captured as part of the consultations on the licensing scheme and the display regulations, as well as before Part 5 of the Bill comes into force.

Let me start by saying I strongly agree with the intention behind the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kamall. When it comes to consulting on the regulations, of course we must ensure that those who will be impacted are able to contribute their views. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, for her constructive comments on the need to do that and on the way we will go forward.