Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 23rd April 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to support the Bill. I do not propose to make any attempt at analysis of it or the breadth of its implications. Happily, there is no need for me to do that because my noble friend the Minister did so in an excellent opening speech, for which I thank and congratulate her. I agree that, in particular, the complementary speech of the noble Earl, Lord Howe, covered the other issues that I may have tried to get involved in, but I have nothing like the experience that there is in this House of this journey to try to improve the health of the nation—despite the fact that the tobacco companies are determined to kill our citizens—that I could contribute, so I intend to focus on only a couple of very specific points.

The first is the philosophical divide that I have heard about between those who, like me, support the Bill and those who feel it represents an unacceptable curtailment of individual liberty. I will leave it to the parliamentary colleagues of the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, to deal with his speech rather than get involved in that. The Bill is obviously consonant with the traditions of the Labour Party—mobilising the resources of the state to ameliorate the health and general condition of the people—but, as many Conservative MPs, including Jesse Norman, have made clear, it also tallies with the mainstream traditions of the Official Opposition. It takes a Conservative approach in effecting reform gradually; protects young people from a dangerous, addictive drug; supports the NHS; and will save taxpayers and society an enormous cost in money and, more importantly, lives. As the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, has persuaded your Lordships better than I could, there may be libertarian arguments against the Bill, but there are few truly Conservative ones.

Given the overwhelming majority afforded the Bill at Second Reading in the other place, we know that it will progress to the statute book, but it is important to win arguments as well as votes. Of course, the genesis of the Bill took place under the last Conservative Administration and, in that context, I trust that the viewpoint of those who are friends—even if critical friends—of the Bill on the other side of your Lordships’ House will be given due weight.

My other point is a very specific one related to the devolved Administrations, which has been dealt with partly already by a contribution from Northern Ireland. In this context, it is worth saying that the implementation of the provisions of the Bill would proportionally affect Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland slightly more than England, given the greater incidence of smoking in these parts of the UK.

I have met wholly unrepentant smokers in my life; I have met countless more who tell me that they wish that they had never started; but I have never, ever met any non-smoker who ruefully confessed that they wished they had started smoking at an early age before rushing out, like one of Tennyson’s lotus eaters, to abandon themselves to the pleasures of nicotine. It is instructive that fewer than 1% of smokers start after the age of 26, and 75% have their first cigarettes before they are even legally allowed so to do. What follows is that two-thirds of adult smokers in Scotland wish that they had never taken up the habit in the first place. What does that suggest? It suggests that this habit takes hold at an age when impulse control is at its weakest and when people are more susceptible to influence. By the time that the demerits of smoking become unpleasantly clear, smokers are in the grip of a potent addiction.

I do not have time to do more than mention this statistic in the hope that others will take it up, but it is worth mentioning the fourfold increase in e-cigarette use among 16 to 24 year-olds in Scotland, with 22% using e-cigarettes in 2023. This has not been met with a correspondingly large drop-off in smoking rates in that age group over that period. Almost all of Part 2 of the Bill requires a legislative consent Motion. Happily, there is already one lodged with the Scottish Parliament. If the Bill goes through relatively untroubled by significant amendment, I hope that we can see its provisions come into force across the UK at speed. It will have my full support as it makes its way through your Lordships’ House.