Cigarette Packaging

Jim Sheridan Excerpts

Tuesday 17th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West) (Lab)]

May I first thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting us this debate this evening? Despite the lateness of the hour, I am pleased to see you honouring our debate with your presence and lending it the importance that we attach to it.

I want to emphasise at the beginning that the anti-smoking campaign and public health campaigns have always been and will remain all-party issues. There are no party politics as far as I am concerned. It is good to see the Minister with responsibility for public health in the Chamber, preparing to reply to the debate. Like all those who have been involved in such campaigns over the years, I am pleased that the Government have renewed the importance that the previous Government, individuals and parties have attached to reducing smoking through public health campaigns.

We should recognise at the outset how effective public health campaigns can be. They have been effective in respect, for example, of seat belts as well as in reducing the prevalence of smoking. It is fair to say that the previous “Smoking Kills” campaign was extremely successful—smoking fell by half among children and by a quarter among adults. However, smoking remains the major cause of premature death and disease, killing more than 100,000 people in the UK each year, more than the next six causes of preventable death put together. However, the rate of decline has slowed in recent years, as the Government pointed out in their paper on the consultation, in which they say that since 2007 the figures for the prevalence of smoking have hardly moved. That stubborn resistance to getting the figure below 21% means that the issue is not going to go away. We have to confront it. As the Government’s paper rightly says, we have to see what further measures can be taken that are effective and acceptable to the country as a whole.

The other important point about the smoking campaign that we have to bear in mind is that although public awareness is vital to its success, the problem starts with children, usually before they are 18. Indeed, two thirds of smokers first pick up the habit when they are under 18. Every year, 340,000 children in the UK are tempted to try smoking. Although these facts are well known, they bear repeating. They provide the background to our debate, compelling our attention and bringing us to the consideration of plain packaging. However, “plain packaging” can be a misleading term, as some right hon. and hon. Members have pointed out. It is anything but plain in Australia, for example, which is ahead of us in pursuing a plain packaging strategy. Indeed, it can lend itself to the sorts of graphic images on the covers of cigarette packages that have proved so successful and that were at the centre of the effective “Smoking Kills” campaign. Those of us who back that approach—I shall call it “plain packaging” for the sake of simplicity—believe that it is the next effective step that could be taken, following the ad ban, putting tobacco out of sight in shops, increasing the age of sale from 16 to 18, and increasing the size and impact of the warnings on packs.

It is remarkable that the figure still stands at 21%, despite all that we have done and despite the great public support that the campaigns against smoking have successfully awakened. We realise that getting rid of the glitzy packaging in itself is unlikely to have much impact on addicted smokers. However, the systematic review of the evidence that the Government published yesterday, when they launched this welcome consultation period, suggests that there is at least some evidence that plain packs are less attractive and appealing, particularly to young people.

[Jim Sheridan (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (Lab)]

Most sensible people would welcome the Government’s consultation on this serious issue. However, one consequence of plain packaging is that thousands of people could lose their jobs printing cigarette packets. May I therefore ask the Government, through my hon. Friend, to explore all options to safeguard the jobs of those who print the cigarette packets?

[Mr Robinson]

I am grateful for that intervention. The concern about jobs in the printing and packaging industry will be shared by many, particularly Members from Northern Ireland, who still have a fairly large tobacco-related industry in their constituencies. We can come to that in due course, but the fact is that none of us wants to stop the progressive reduction in smoking, and if it seems a reasonable presumption that reducing the attractiveness of the packaging will help, we must face up to the jobs implications. However, I hasten to add that, having considered the issue in the round, I do not think that the implications will be so severe, because after all, as I have pointed out already, we are not talking about “plain” packaging. The same inventiveness and printing of graphic images that have already been brought to bear will continue; indeed, they will be put to much better use than trying to encourage youngsters to try smoking because it seems attractive or because cigarettes are packaged as lipstick, or any of the other advertising gimmicks that have been used.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anne Milton]

I will come on to deal specifically with that point. Like the hon. Member for Coventry North West, I am sure that this will not be the last debate we have on this issue. It will be important to dispel some of the myths, and this week Cancer Research UK has put out a good piece of information that does so.

As I say, the Government have an open mind, and it is important that we hear everyone’s views. We will keep that open mind until the consultation closes. The consultation has four aims: to reduce the appeal of tobacco products to consumers; to increase the effectiveness of the health warnings; to reduce the ability of tobacco packaging to mislead consumers about the harmful effects of smoking; and to have a positive effect on smoking-related attitudes, beliefs, intentions and behaviours, particularly among young people and children. The consultation will be open from 16 April to 10 July, and I encourage all hon. Members, and any other person, business or organisation with an interest, to respond to it.

[Jim Sheridan]

As chair of the Unite union parliamentary group, which includes an awful lot of health service workers, who agree wholeheartedly with what the Government are trying to achieve, I wrote to the Department some weeks ago seeking a meeting to discuss the jobs implications. Is there anything the Minister can do to expedite a response to that request?

[Anne Milton]

I will certainly look into the matter, and I apologise if the hon. Gentleman has not received a timely response. I would hope that we would always give him such a response, and I will make sure that he gets one. He mentions jobs, but we have also to consider the human costs of smoking-related disease. If breadwinners in families die prematurely, that has an implication for families. This is not just about jobs.

Any decisions to take further policy action on tobacco packaging will, as I say, be taken only after full consideration of the consultation responses and of any other relevant information or evidence, which is emerging all the time. In addition, we will explore any implications relating to the sale of illicit tobacco, a matter that has been raised. I point out that existing packs are very easy to forge; covert markings are already used to distinguish illicit cigarettes and this proposal will make absolutely no difference to the situation.

Our tobacco control plan explicitly complements Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and the UK Border Agency’s strategy to tackle the illicit trade in tobacco products, which was published in April 2011. There is absolutely no room for complacency, but thanks to the hard work of HMRC, local councils, the NHS and civil society, good progress is being made in reducing the amount of illegal tobacco products finding their way on to the market. According to the latest information collected by HMRC, fewer people are using illicit tobacco. Illicit sales of cigarettes were down to 10% in 2010 from 21% in 2000—that is a marked reduction. The figure for hand-rolling tobacco remains high, at 47%, but it has reduced from 61%. So the trend is in the right direction. I particularly wish to compliment the north of England tackling illicit tobacco for better health programme—some of these programmes have ghastly names, do they not? None the less, it is an example of how organisations can work together to tackle the supply of and demand for illicit tobacco. In coming to a view on the impact of standardised packaging, the availability of illicit tobacco will obviously be important, but we do want to see good, hard evidence on this.