Health and Care Bill

Lord Naseby Excerpts

Lords Hansard _ Part 1 & Report stage
Wednesday 16th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rennard (LD)]

My Lords, I speak in support of these amendments, to which I have added my name, and which are in accordance with my party’s policy.

In Committee, there was almost universal support for dealing with health inequality issues, and there was widespread recognition that, as the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, said, half the difference in life expectancy between the richest and the poorest people in this country is caused by smoking. There are many ways in which we can further reduce the prevalence of smoking, and those of us who are members of the APPG on Smoking and Health set them out during the course of our debates.

However, we are concentrating today on just one key principle which is necessary if the Government’s target of reducing the prevalence of smoking to 5% or below is to be achieved by 2030. That principle is finding the funds to support smoking cessation and tobacco control measures through a levy on the tobacco companies. This would help to ameliorate the terrible damage done by their products, which includes shortening the lives of half the people who use them.

The funding for local authorities to pursue tobacco control policies such as smoking cessation services and enforcement and for national mass media campaigns has been cut significantly. Without the proposed levy, the NHS will face greater costs in future in dealing with the many issues, such as lung cancer and heart disease, which arise in part because of smoking tobacco.

Last month, together with other officers of the APPG on Smoking and Health, I had the pleasure of meeting Javed Khan, chair of the Government’s independent review into smoking. He listened carefully to all our proposals, particularly on the levy, and certainly understood the necessity of funding being found. The Government have asked him to say what the most impactful interventions that could be taken forward in the new tobacco control plan would be. He told us that if nothing different is done, the Government’s smoke-free target will not be met. He promised that his recommendations would be “bold and brave”, as I hope they will.

I expect that we will soon get some soothing words from the Minister. But before he replies to this debate, I ask him to consider how, in “Hamlet”, King Claudius has to admit that

“words without thoughts never to heaven go”.

I hope the Minister will give us not just warm words about tobacco control but confirm that the Government have thought about the tobacco levy and will undertake a formal consultation on it.

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

My Lords, I hasten to say to your Lordships that I do not smoke and have never smoked. In considering the amendments before us this afternoon, it is worth giving some of the official statistics rather than the aspirational ones. Smoking rates in England continue to decline year on year and that has been a trend for the last 30 years. According to the Office for National Statistics in 2021, smoking rates in England have declined significantly, from 20% in 2011 to 12% in 2020. The decline in the number of smokers has resulted in a reduction in the cost to the NHS of treating the impact of smoking. In 2015, Public Health England estimated that the total smoking-related cost to NHS England was £2.6 billion a year, when 18% of the population smoked. This figure and the corresponding cost to NHS England over the last five years have declined further, given the 12% smoking rate in England in 2020. According to NHS data published in 2019 on smoking, drinking and drug use among young people, the number of young people aged 11 to 15 smoking has declined dramatically, from 16% to just 5% in 2018. According to the Office for National Statistics in 2021, only 12% of 18 to 24 year-olds in Great Britain smoke, a major reduction from 26% in 2011 and the lowest smoking rate across all age groups except the over-65s.

By way of background, according to the most recent HMRC tax gap data, illegal smuggling and consumption of illicit tobacco cost Her Majesty’s Government £2.3 billion in lost revenue in 2019-20, a figure that remains unchanged from the fiscal year 2016-17, which reinforces the fact that the Government’s anti-illicit tobacco strategy is not working. It ought to be working, when you have a situation where a group of companies is working with the Department for Health and has done over many years. Frankly, it is a sad reflection on the status of HMRC that this illicit tobacco importation is increasing. You have only to look at what is happening in Dover or any of our other ports today to see why it is increasing. It is a pathetic and embarrassing performance at Dover at the moment, the net result being not just tobacco but illegal alcohol and so on coming in.

Now we look at the idea of a levy, something that has never been in the manifesto of a Conservative Government to the best of my knowledge. A levy on any company prescribed by government, even companies trading locally, certainly does not fit into the basic elements of our financial and economic strategy. If it was just a levy on cigarettes, there might be half a case, but this is on anything to do with tobacco. Most of all those other products have no effect on people’s health—they are a matter of enjoyment—but this idea goes across the whole lot. It has not been thought through.

It is all very well my noble friend Lord Young on the Back Benches saying that there was a consultation in 2015 on a levy on tobacco manufacturers’ profits and the Government concluded that it would be unworkable, but that was because we were in the EU so it has all changed now. I say to my noble friend on the Front Bench: I would have thought he had enough on his hands without introducing a complicated levy, but that is my personal view. There was an exchange between the Exchequer Secretary and the then shadow Exchequer Secretary, confirming

“that our position regarding the 2015 consultation stands. A levy would be a complex”—

this is not going to change—

“and costly way of raising money to fund tobacco control measures and would be unlikely to provide a stable revenue stream.”

I say to my noble friends on all sides of the House that tobacco manufacturers already invest hundreds of millions of pounds every year in R&D and highly skilled jobs to bring to market alternative smoke-free nicotine products. Some of your Lordships may use e-cigarettes, nicotine pouches or heated tobacco products. Further tax increases on manufacturers as a whole will have the effect of reducing that investment, which is not a very clever way forward.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I do not recall anybody suggesting in the debate that tobacco companies should be made illegal. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, is not suggesting that, just because the number of smokers is going down, nothing more should be done. I thought I heard the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, suggest that, if we carry on at this rate, it will be another 25 years before we get to where we need to be.

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

I was suggesting that we do carry on because the evidence is there in government data, not in a forecast from the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, or some minor operation that he—

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I remind noble Lords that only short questions of elucidation are allowed on Report.