Smoking: Cigarette Packaging

Earl Howe Excerpts

Tuesday 16th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Finlay of Llandaff]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the basis for the decision not to proceed with standardised packaging of cigarettes.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Earl Howe)]

Standardised packaging remains a policy under active consideration. The Government have not ruled out its introduction. However, we want to spend more time assimilating information about the likely effect of such a policy in this country and learning from experience abroad. Let me be clear: we are not going soft on tobacco, which is a leading cause of premature death. We have an ambitious tobacco control plan and will press ahead with tobacco control policies, including removing tobacco from displays in shops.

[Baroness Finlay of Llandaff]

I declare my interest as president-elect of the BMA. As 200,000 11 to 15 year- olds start smoking each year in the UK, what are the criteria and time frames that the Government will use to judge the outcomes of standardised packaging in Australia? The high mortality rate does not appear until about 25 years after these youngsters start smoking. As this is fundamentally a child protection issue, how will the Government now prevent vulnerable children—particularly those in local authority care—from starting smoking, given that the Department of Health’s own systematic review showed that current packs are particularly attractive to youngsters and that they mislead them into thinking that some brands are less harmful than others?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, we want to keep a close eye on what is happening around the world before making a decision. We are keeping standardised packaging under active consideration. It has been newly introduced in Australia, and other countries are intending to follow suit, so it is sensible for us to see what we can learn from other countries’ experience. The impacts could be several. They could include, for example, health benefits, as well as impacts on businesses such as retailers and tobacco manufacturers, and could possibly bring about a change in attitude to smoking.

On the risk to children, the noble Baroness is of course absolutely right. Evidence suggests that action needs to be taken to reshape social norms around smoking so that tobacco becomes less desirable, less acceptable and less accessible, particularly to the young. That is why we are committed to ending tobacco displays in shops. We have a TV-led marketing campaign to encourage smokers not to smoke at home or in cars and we have banned the sale of tobacco in vending machines, which has removed a source of cigarettes that underage smokers could access as often as they liked. There is a range of work going on.

[Lord Naseby]

May I—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Naseby]

I congratulate my noble friend on not rushing in to another unproven restriction on the consumption of alcohol, particularly one which has legal dimensions that affect intellectual property rights. Can he confirm that consumption of cigarettes is already falling, and that we are already spending something like over £50 million on tobacco control? Is not the greatest problem at the moment illegal smuggling of cigarettes into this country, which costs the Revenue a huge amount of money—close on £200 million—and is consumed principally by young people?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, smoking rates in the UK are lower than those in many comparable western societies, but our reductions in prevalence still lag behind those in countries such as Canada and the United States, and in some Australian states. Overall prevalence is gradually coming down, but we still need to worry about smoking take-up by the young. There is no doubt that smoking is a significant cause of health inequalities in the UK.

On illicit trade, the story is quite positive. In 2000 around 21% of the UK’s cigarette market was illicit, whereas the latest estimate from HMRC for 2010-11 is that around 9% of the cigarette market is illicit. That is too much; nevertheless, we are heading in the right direction.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

Does the Minister recall that when he was a shadow Minister opposing our legislation, he regularly met Gardant Communications on behalf of Philip Morris International? May I ask him very gently: who does he think had the greatest influence on this U-turn—his friends at Gardant or Lynton Crosby?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, I have never adopted a personal position on plain packaging; the noble Lord is wrong about that. As an opposition spokesman, yes, I did make it my business to talk to all sectors—to the tobacco companies, to ASH and to other lobby groups—to make sure that the picture I presented from the Benches on which he now sits was a balanced one. I took no personal position, nor, indeed, a position on behalf of the Conservative Party; I need to make that very clear. The decision that the Government have taken has been in no way influenced by Mr Crosby.

[Lord Taverne]

My Lords, will the Government take into account the effect of postponing a decision, in the light of the very strong evidence cited by the Public Health Research Consortium in coming to the conclusion that such a measure would help to deter smoking? That seemed to be confirmed by the statement by the brand director of Imperial Tobacco that now that advertising was banned, the company should look at the design of packaging. Is it not unwise for the Prime Minister, after the Coulson disaster, the decision on alcohol pricing and the postponement of a register of lobbyists, to have appointed as special adviser to the Government someone who has turned out to be a lobbyist for the alcohol and tobacco industries?

[Earl Howe]

I emphasise that the Government have by no means a closed mind on the issue of plain packaging of tobacco—quite the reverse. We want to take the time needed to consider fully the many relevant issues around standardised packaging, before making any decision. My noble friend’s last comment might have had greater force if I had been announcing that we would not be proceeding with plain packaging, but that is not the case.