Tobacco and Vapes Bill (Fifteenth sitting)

Debate between Mary Kelly Foy and Caroline Johnson

Committee stage
Thursday 30th January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

I will not be pushing this new clause to a vote; nevertheless, I think it is a policy that the Minister should take into consideration. New clause 2 would require the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to consult on a “polluter pays” levy. The Minister will know that I and members of the all-party parliamentary group on smoking and health have campaigned for this for some time. It was also recommended in the Khan review in 2022 and, more recently, by the Institute for Public Policy Research’s commission on health and prosperity.

Action on Smoking and Health estimates that smoking costs England more than £43 billion a year. That is more than £27 billion in productivity costs, nearly £14 billion in social care costs and more than £1.8 billion in NHS costs—and much more. A “polluter pays” levy on tobacco manufacturers could raise around £700 million a year, with that money coming from tobacco companies’ profits, not raised from consumers.

A levy of this kind would provide sustainable funding for tobacco control and could be given to organisations such as Fresh, the tobacco control programme in the north-east, which does such vital work in ensuring that no one gets left behind as we move to a smoke-free future. In fact, all the Government’s programmes on tobacco, including mass media campaigns, incentives for pregnant women and support for smokers with mental health problems, could be funded many times over, with cash to spare that could go to other public health initiatives.

This would be subject to consultation, but the model proposed by Action on Smoking and Health would cap the wholesale price of tobacco, similarly to how we cap the prices of essential utilities and hence limit profits. The big four tobacco companies account for 95% of UK sales and make excessive profits selling a highly addictive product that kills two in three long-term users when used as intended by the manufacturer. Tobacco manufacturers make an estimated £900 million in profit per year in the UK, with an average net operating profit margin of about 50%. For context, the average profit margin for UK manufacturing is 10%.

There is widespread public support for this measure: 79% of adults in Great Britain would support a levy on the tobacco industry, with only 5% opposed. I hope the Government will seriously consider this, because it would complement the intentions of the Bill.

[Dr Johnson]

I am interested by this new clause. Tax is applied to some products that the Government would like us to consume less of, to make them more expensive so that we consume less of them, and that has been the case with tobacco for some time.

Looking at the current levels of tobacco duty, we see that tax on cigarettes is 16.5% of the retail price of £6.69 for a pack of 20, which is quite a substantial proportion of the cost. Cigars are taxed at £4.17 on a 10 gram cigar, and there is 14.3% tax on a £30 packet of hand-rolling tobacco.

The Government introduced an escalator for further increases in tobacco taxation in their autumn Budget. In addition, they have introduced a tax on vaping products, which will help to take them out of the reach of pocket money. Personally, I have been quite concerned about the fact that vaping products are so cheap that children can easily buy a vape with pocket money, and if they are potentially about to get caught, they can discard it without worrying and then buy another one. A tax on vaping products is, therefore, a welcome initiative.

However, as I understand it, the Government make £8.8 billion per year from tobacco taxation—I am sure the Minister will correct me if that figure is wrong—and it is in the gift of the Chancellor to increase these taxes if she wants to. She is quite good at increasing taxes, so I am sure she knows that that is the case.

As I understand it, the hon. Member for City of Durham proposes that the tax on these products should automatically go towards improving the health—including the public health—of the nation, as opposed to going into general funds. In practice, the Government are already free to spend the money that they receive from tobacco and vape taxation on the health service. They certainly already spend more on the health service than they receive in tobacco taxes. It is a choice. To govern is to choose, and they are choosing how they wish to spend the taxes they raise.

The new clause proposes

“limiting the profits which may accrue to any producer or importer”.

Presumably, that would require some sort of open-book system, and I am not quite sure how the hon. Lady thinks that would work. This level of regulation of the market would require quite detailed open-book working. Perhaps she would like to explain why she thinks that is necessary, when the Government already have in their remit the levers of taxation specifically for these products.

[Mary Kelly Foy]

The difference is that the tax would not come from the consumers. This would be a tax on the big four tobacco companies, rather than raising taxes from consumers. We know that consumers of these products are already likely to come from deprived backgrounds. In addition to raising revenue, the measure would allow us to impose much tighter controls on the prices of tobacco products. That would disincentivise the tobacco industry from creating so much profit from their products.

Although the Chancellor can use taxes for whatever purpose, this measure would be a tax on those companies whose product, as we know, kills one in two of the people who use it. Just raising taxes in the way that the hon. Lady describes would be an extra burden on the consumers who we are trying to help quit tobacco.

[Dr Johnson]

I thank the hon. Lady for her explanation, which was really helpful. I am grateful that she, as a Labour MP, understands that a tax on business will be passed on to the consumer, because it seems that the Chancellor does not. Perhaps the hon. Lady should apply for a new job.

The hon. Lady is right that if taxes are applied to a business, the business will pass them on to the consumer. The only way to avoid that is through price control. Nevertheless, I do not think that makes price control a desirable thing for the Government to interfere with. That level of regulation would go too far, and other measures in the Bill already seek to restrict and disincentivise smoking in so many different ways. I hope that they will be effective and that there will be no need for such onerous regulation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mary Kelly Foy]

The new clause would be a game changer. One of the questions was whether the measure might later be applied to other areas—I presume that the hon. Member means taxing the big alcohol and gambling companies—but tobacco is a uniquely lethal and addictive product, so in this case the intervention is justified. She makes a good and compelling point, but I think the Government’s overall health strategy is to shift from sickness to prevention, which will require looking at all habits and supporting people to live healthier lives in healthy environments.

[Dr Johnson]

I have been listening carefully to the hon. Lady. Does she have a price for tobacco products in mind? Governments of different colours have increased tobacco duty a bit at a time, presumably to nudge behaviour. If we do not increase it enough, we do not have the desired effect, but if we increase it too much and too fast, we potentially drive people into illicit-market tobacco. We heard from the chief medical officer about the difficulties people have in giving up cigarettes because of the profoundly addictive nature of nicotine, so if we were to increase the prices too quickly, we could end up making life difficult for people who are poor and addicted to nicotine, without the necessary support in place. If the prices are going to go up to somewhere in the middle, how is that different from taxation?

[Mary Kelly Foy]

The new clause asks for a consultation, so a lot of issues would need to be worked through with the Chancellor. However, the tobacco companies make exorbitant profits from a product that kills the folk to they sell it to, so I am sure that the shadow Minister would agree that that means we should use some of their profits to pay for the damage being done.

[Dr Johnson]

I certainly agree that it is immoral to sell products that they know are addictive, are dangerous and kill people.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mary Kelly Foy]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 4

Ban on supply of cigarette filters

“(1) The Secretary of State must make regulations under section 140 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 having the effect of prohibiting the supply of relevant cigarette filters or cigarettes containing relevant cigarette filters, whether by way of sale or not, in the course of a business.

(2) The notice required under section 140(6)(b) of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 in relation to the regulations mentioned in subsection (1) must be published no later than the end of the period of 6 months beginning with the day on which this Act is passed.

(3) In this section,

‘relevant cigarette filter’ means a filter which contains plastic and which is intended for use in a cigarette, whether as part of a ready made cigarette or to be used with hand rolling tobacco or other substances to be smoked in a cigarette.”—(Dr Caroline Johnson.)

This new clause requires the Secretary of State to make regulations which would prohibit the supply of cigarette filters which contain plastic or cigarettes containing cigarette filters which contain plastic. The regulations would be made under section 140 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990.

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Dr Johnson]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

I am sorry that the hon. Member for Dartford is not here to discuss his important new clause 4, which is about a ban on cigarette filters. I asked the Minister why cigarette filters were not included in clause 1, along with cigarette papers and tobacco products. Cigarette filters have a health effect, but it is not necessarily the effect that most people think. Filters were first introduced in the 1950s in response to mounting scientific evidence highlighting the dangers of smoking. The tobacco industry seized upon the opportunity to present the filter as a way to make cigarettes safer. It claimed that they reduced the inhalation of harmful substances such as nicotine, tar and other toxicants.

The early filters were made of cork, which is the origin of the cork pattern that can still be seen on many cigarettes. By the end of the 1950s, sales of cigarettes with filters had surged to more than 40% of the market, and by 1965, more than 60% of cigarettes were manufactured with filters. Alongside that shift, the marketing of light and mild cigarettes with ventilated filters further enhanced the illusion—and it is an illusion—of reduced harm, making smoking appear to customers more palatable, and to some extent reducing customer awareness of the risks involved.

There were some early studies that appeared to support the tobacco industry’s claims. Filter tip cigarettes at that time were thought to be associated with lower rates of lung cancer and mortality, compared with their unfiltered counterparts. However, when comprehensive and rigorous studies were completed over time, the initial findings were disproven. Subsequent epidemiological data revealed that both ventilated and non-ventilated filter tip cigarettes were just as harmful as unfiltered cigarettes. In fact, the incidence of lung adenocarcinoma—a type of lung cancer that has increasingly replaced the more prevalent squamous cell carcinoma—has risen significantly in recent decades. The rise in adenocarcinomas is believed to be linked to the use of ventilated filters, as they affect smoking behaviour and the combustion of the product.

One of the key reasons why filter tip cigarettes fail to reduce the risk of lung cancer and other diseases is the changes they cause in smoking behaviour. When cigarette filters were introduced, they altered the way people smoked. For example, smokers began taking longer and deeper puffs, increasing their exposure to harmful chemicals in the smoke. Such behaviours may have upset the potential benefits that some individuals thought filters might have in reducing the toxic smoke inhaled.

The presence of a filter, especially those with ventilation, changed the combustion of the cigarette itself. That led to a greater exposure in smokers to tobacco-specific nitrosamines, which are potent carcinogens and a major contributor to lung cancer. The filtering process did not remove those harmful substances, and in some cases may even have enhanced their presence in the smoke that smokers inhaled.

Another concerning aspect of modern cigarette filters is the material from which they are made. The most common material used is cellulose acetate—a synthetic plastic that, when inhaled, can contribute to respiratory issues. The fibres and microplastics from filters can embed in the lungs, potentially leading to long-term damage. Although that material can be effective in filtering out some particles, it does not remove gases of low molecular weight, such as carbon monoxide, which are also harmful to health.

Despite cigarette filters being marketed as a safer option, their widespread use over the past 60 years has had little effect on reducing the health risk of smoking. In fact, it may have contributed to a decrease in public awareness about the dangers of smoking, and may have led to more people becoming addicted to smoking without fully understanding the risks involved.

I note that new clause 4 suggests that the Environmental Protection Act 1990 should be used to ban the supply of cigarette filters, because they have a significant environmental impact. Roughly 4.5 trillion cigarette filters are disposed of annually, making them the most littered man-made waste item in the world and accounting for roughly a third of all litter found in coastal and urban clean-ups. Despite their small size, the sheer volume of discarded cigarette butts would fill almost 50,000 shipping containers every single year, and that is expected to increase by 50% in 2025.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill (Tenth sitting)

Debate between Mary Kelly Foy and Caroline Johnson

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Mary Kelly Foy]

No, I do not. As I said, the Department is consulting on pack inserts, but that may not capture the people who have or are offered one cigarette. We all know that it takes only one cigarette to become addicted. Does the Minister have a timeframe that the Department is working to for the introduction of pack inserts? Will the Department monitor the effectiveness of that and continue to look at evidence from other countries, such as Canada, where dissuasive cigarettes do have an impact, and potentially use the powers in the Bill to introduce dissuasive individual cigarettes at a later stage?

[Dr Caroline Johnson]

I thank the hon. Member for City of Durham for tabling this amendment, supported by my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman). I suspect that it is a reversal of the process from the last Committee, when my hon. Friend was on that Committee and moved a similar amendment, which was supported by the hon. Lady.

This is not a new suggestion. In fact, looking back at the debate from the last iteration of this Bill—I think it was about new clause 5 at the time—I discovered that it was the noble Lord Young of Cookham who first proposed warnings on cigarettes in 1979. He said:

“The solution to many of today’s medical problems will not be found in the research laboratories of our hospitals, but in our Parliaments. For the prospective patient, the answer may not be cure by incision at the operating table, but prevention by decision at the Cabinet table…Historically, a nation would look to its doctors for better health. Now they should look to their Members of Parliament.”

That is one of the reasons why I am here, standing with you today, and why I see a number of other medical professionals on the Opposition Benches. Parliament offers the opportunity not to look after one’s patients one at a time, but to look after the health of many patients all at the same time. I hope that we will seize that opportunity in relation to the public health measures in much of this Bill. My noble friend in the other House, Lord Young, has now been in Parliament for over 50 years—I hope we will get round to bringing forward some of the things he has proposed before another 50 years go by. The proposal was supported not only by the noble Lord Young, but by Sir Stephen Powis, then director of NHS England, and by the Khan review.

However, I have a couple of questions. I understand the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Windsor is making, which is that if people sell cigarettes only in packages and the packages are, as we have discussed, very thoroughly controlled in terms of what they look like and what they say, is it then necessary to mark the cigarettes that are inside them? I also understand that in clause 4, we as a Committee have chosen to introduce a measure that bans the sale of single cigarettes, but despite that being something people should already not do, it does happen, as we heard from the Royal College of Physicians in its evidence at the beginning of the Committee proceedings on 7 January.

There is some benefit to marking the cigarettes. It is also the case that it does not look terribly cool to have a stick sticking out of one’s mouth that says “Smoking kills”, and I get that. One question I would ask, though—perhaps the hon. Member for City of Durham will know the answer to this—is what they use to dye the papers chemically and what the effect of breathing in the smoke from the dyes is.

We talked about cigarette papers and why they are being banned at the beginning of the Bill; we talked about the chemicals put into cigarette papers to colour the paper, to ensure that the ash is white, to control how fast it burns and so on. If cigarette papers are to be marked with a message, that will require inks of some description, which will then be burned and the smoke from them inhaled. I do not know whether the hon. Lady has information on whether that can be done without adding additional harm to an already harmful product. On the one hand, what is the benefit of adding the message to reduce people’s uptake of cigarettes, and on the other, what harm is added to the cigarette by adding the message?

Cigarette papers already have a lot of pictures on them. I do not know whether the Minister will change that under clause 90, but health warnings on cigarette papers, as opposed to the cigarettes that come pre-rolled, would have the same effect: if one is printing a message on them, what harm is one adding and what risks is one taking away? I suppose he would have to look at both the risks and the benefits.

Clause 91 relates to the features of the products. Subsection (1) authorises the Secretary of State to make regulations on the features of various products, including

“(i) tobacco products,

(ii) tobacco related devices,

(iii) herbal smoking products,

(iv) cigarette papers,

(v) vaping products, or

(vi) nicotine products,”,

covering such aspects as the marking on the products, including branding, trademarks and logos, and the information provided with them. It also includes regulations on the appearance, size and shape of products and any distinguishing features that could differentiate brands.

Subsection (2) states that the regulations may include

“prohibitions, requirements or limitations in relation to the production, importation or supply of such products in the course of business.”

Subsection (3) clarifies that regulations made under this section are also subject to the affirmative resolution procedure, so the Minister is correct that at some point there will be a short delegated legislation meeting to debate them, but there will not be as much time to scrutinise them as there is in this Bill Committee.

The shape and size of packaging and of products have changed over time. Tobacco always used to be sold in bulk or in pouches by weight and wrapped in simple paper packaging. Cigarettes were not very common, and most tobacco products at that stage were loose-leaf cigars or pipe tobacco. The size and shape of the packages was straightforward, and the design at that time was more for preservation than marketing. As the industry grew, they became more standardised and recognisable. The first iconic package designs were rectangular boxes, usually made from cardboard, with a flip-top opening containing 10, 20 or 25 cigarettes.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill (Fourth sitting)

Debate between Mary Kelly Foy and Caroline Johnson

Committee stage
Thursday 9th January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Dr Johnson]

If one is expected to have a policy, guidance on what that policy should contain is certainly important. If one is going to be held accountable for not having such a policy in law, it is clearly not sufficient to say, “You must have a policy but we are not going to tell you what it must say or do.” It comes back to the point that I have been making throughout the day. Who will face this fine? How will it be decided who the fine applies to? Will it be applied to the retailer as well as to shop workers, shop supervisors, shift supervisors or CEOs, and under what circumstances? I think there needs to be guidance on that so we have a clear pathway.

Clause 1 states that it is a defence if someone has taken “all reasonable steps”. If having a policy is not to be a reasonable step—there are arguments for why we might not want it to be, because it is an extra regulatory burden on business, and some very small businesses could struggle with that—and neither is looking at someone and making one’s own mind up, it is important to understand what is. I do not think we have got to the bottom of that yet.

My final question for the hon. Member for City of Durham, who tabled new clause 3, is: why not Northern Ireland? I think one reason why she has chosen to introduce this is because there is such a policy for Scotland, but not for England and Wales. I do not believe there is such a policy for Northern Ireland either, and I wonder why she did not seek to correct that in her new clause. It may be something that she wants to consider in refining such a new clause before Report.

[Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)]

I wish to speak to new clause 3, which is in my name. I do not intend to press it to a vote, and I will be very brief because there has been a lot of discussion—about three and a half hours—on this part of the Bill already, and I hope it will answer some of those points. I am introducing it because I think it would enhance the Bill’s consistency with the Government’s four-nations approach. New clause 3 would apply to all the nations of the United Kingdom mandatory age verification for purchasing tobacco, vapes and non-medicinal nicotine products, in line with the provisions set out for Scotland in the Bill.

Scotland has had mandatory age verification for anyone who looks under 20 as a legal requirement for purchasing tobacco and vapes since 2017. In lay terms, there is a legal underpinning for Challenge 25, which is voluntary in the rest of the UK. The Bill amends the Scottish system so that from 2033, it will be a legal requirement to verify the age of anyone trying to purchase tobacco who looks like they were born on or after 1 January 2009. My new clause would simply extend that beyond Scotland to ensure consistency for retailers, customers and enforcement agencies.

[Mary Kelly Foy]

The new clause will make the policy consistent across the nations and simplify the process. If I can carry on, I will expand on those points. The new clause will extend the policy further than Scotland and simplify the process for retailers, customers and enforcement agencies. There has already been a lot of discussion about the implementation of a smoke-free generation, and about trying to make it simple and easy to understand. We heard in oral evidence concerns about the difficulty, when the policy has been in place for some decades, in telling the difference between two individuals in their forties who fall on either side of the policy. While that is likely to be a marginal issue in practice, the new clause will further help to resolve it.

Mandatory age verification currently exists in Scotland and is supported by retailers here. In response to the Minister’s point about it possibly being a burden on businesses, a survey of independent UK tobacco retailers by Action on Smoking and Health in 2024 found that more than seven out of 10 retailers—71%—in England and Wales supported this.

[Dr Johnson]

We have heard dreadful stories of retailers who have experienced nasty abuse and, in some cases, violence when they have asked for someone’s age. If somebody knew for certain that they would have their ID checked, it would no longer be an evaluation by the shopkeeper of their age, but merely a simple, expected transaction.

[Mary Kelly Foy]

I agree. We heard concerns on Tuesday in evidence about the aggression towards retailers, and the impact that the Bill might have on that. I would argue that providing consistency about identification is a potential mitigation of those risks. It takes away the guesswork.

[Dr Johnson]

May I ask the hon. Lady if there is any evidence that in Scotland, it has reduced aggression towards retailers?

[Mary Kelly Foy]

I cannot point to any evidence in statistics, but retailers welcome it. I think 90% of retailers in Scotland are in favour of it. In England, 83% of small retailers agree with it, and I am sure that is because it takes away those cloudy grey areas. It means that once someone shows their ID, that is the end of it.

On the point about this being a slippery slope towards mandatory ID cards, young people now are used to carrying ID. In fact, the Bill provides a list of different forms of ID that people can provide, including passports and driving licences. I believe the Government are talking about introducing digital ID checks for the purchase of alcohol. If this were applied to tobacco, individuals would not need to carry a physical ID with them. The measure is supported by retailers and by seven out of 10 members of the public, as well as by the Local Government Association and trading standards, which both believe it would help with enforcing the legislation and aid prosecution.

I have tabled the new clause to simplify things. This has already happened in Scotland, and it would make the Bill consistent with the Government's four-nation approach. Given the issues that we have been discussing today, having mandatory ID would make things so much easier and simpler. Just to be clear, I will not be pushing it to a vote.