Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Robin Swann Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 26th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Leigh Ingham (Stafford) (Lab)]

I rise today in support of this legislation. Young people vaping is not the biggest issue that comes up in surgeries, but it is one of the biggest issues that comes up when I walk through town or visit a school, and even when I talk to young people themselves. It is an urgent crisis—not just vaping, but smoking. There are around 760 cancer deaths in the areas around Stafford, Eccleshall and the villages every year, and data suggests that in the next five years more than 1,100 of my constituents will have had lung cancer-related issues.

This legislation shows that this Labour Government care about the children of this country. We care about who they are, and who they will become; we want them to live longer, be happier, and never have the chance to pick up a £5 vape or a cheap pack of tobacco that could set them on the path of addiction for the rest of their lives.

I wish to take a moment to acknowledge the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), for starting a version of this Bill and bringing it forward despite significant opposition in his own party. I know that he did it out of concern for the future of the children of this country and I commend him for it.

Today, some will talk about choice when they oppose this Bill. In my work as an MP, I have spoken to people whose lives have been devastated by this addiction. I ask whether those who speak about choice truly believe that, once addiction has taken hold, a person has the same freedom of choice that they once did. This is not about taking choice away; it is about giving people freedom from addiction before it ever appears.

For me, the Bill is also about something so much deeper. It is about time—time with family and time with friends. How many of us have lost loved ones to cancer? I lost my grandfather to cancer, and my mum has had lung cancer. My mum was entirely fit at the time she was diagnosed with lung cancer—she used to do a Joe Wicks workout every morning. As she came from a place in the north where people suffer from lung-related illnesses, she was part of a pilot scheme to scan smokers and previous smokers for issues. Her cancer was caught early, while she had no symptoms. My family know how lucky we are. We were lucky that the cancer, which would have continued to grow in her body, was caught then and there. In fact, the cancer was so small that after it was taken away, she needed no further treatment; just a lobe of her lung was removed. My family could not be more grateful that she was part of that scheme, that she is still doing Joe Wicks exercises in the morning, and that she is still around to play with her grandchildren.

How many more precious moments with families will this Bill provide? That is the only question that I am here to answer. Truly, the children of the future may never know how their lives were changed by this Bill—just as I do not really know how my life was changed by the seatbelt Bill introduced years before I was born—because they will never have picked up the smoking habit in the first place. They will live longer, live healthier, and have more time with the people whom they love. Let this be the generation that ends youth addiction before it begins.

[Robin Swann (South Antrim) (UUP)]

I echo the words of the hon. and learned Member for North Antrim (Jim Allister) with regard to the importance of this Bill applying to all four nations: I want it to cover the entirety of the United Kingdom. Some 2,200 people in Northern Ireland die every year from a smoking-related illness. One in four of our cancer cases is related to smoking. The consultation carried out by the previous Government on their legislation, which was specifically about creating a smokefree generation, found that 62.5% of the UK population were supportive. In Northern Ireland, however, 79% were in favour of bringing forward this legislation.

Back in May 2024, when I was a Northern Ireland Health Minister, I introduced the original legislative consent motion, which received all-party support across the Northern Ireland Assembly, and yes, as the hon. and learned Member for North Antrim has mentioned, there were concerns over the applicability of the measure owing to EU regulations and legislation. There was a concern that the law would remain undelivered in Northern Ireland. At that stage, I engaged with the then UK Government, and have now engaged with this Government to seek assurances that this lifesaving, life-changing legislation will apply equally and favourably to all parts of our United Kingdom. I look forward to the Minister being able to give me those reassurances. I have signed new clause 3, because I accepted those reassurances as Health Minister but would appreciate reinforcement in this legislation.

Much has been said about the entrapment of our young people—whether previously with regard to tobacco, or now with vaping and vaping products and how they are being marketed and presented. One of the most harrowing reports that I have read recently was regarding Alder Hey children’s hospital, which has now opened a clinic for children addicted to nicotine. They became hooked because of vaping. Twelve children between the ages of 11 and 15 have had to seek medical help to cut down and deal with their nicotine addiction. Twelve children between the ages of 11 and 15 are receiving treatment in a children’s hospital due to the evil promotion and enhancement of not just vaping but nicotine. We are looking to save money within our national health service, but we are already encouraging and enabling these young people to become addicted to a dangerous drug. We should be doing everything we can in this place for young people.

According to reports about the Alder Hey clinic, children as young as eight are vaping regularly. Some reportedly cannot get out of bed in the morning before they take their first puff. That is a disgrace. I encourage anyone in this Chamber who in any way opposes the Bill or thinks that this is not the right thing to do to seriously consider how vaping is impacting our young people across this United Kingdom.

I finish by asking the Minister to reassure this House, not just with words but with action. Can she assure those of us from Northern Ireland who have supported the legislation and worked hard to make sure that it had a four-nations approach that the guidance, support and legal enforcement in the Bill is equally applicable to us in Northern Ireland?

[Jim Dickson]

I rise to speak to new clause 14 and amendments 86 and 87. I declare an interest as vice chair of the all-party parliamentary group on smoking and health. I am also a previous smoker and a strong supporter of this legislation.

New clause 14 would introduce a ban on all filters, regardless of whether they contain plastic. I understand the environmental motivations behind new clause 2 from the hon. Member for Gosport (Dame Caroline Dinenage), but I worry that the amendment is not sufficient to address environmental concerns and could even have a damaging impact on public health. Let us start from the understanding that there are no health benefits to filters. They were developed by the tobacco industry following evidence that smoking caused lung cancer in order to give a false sense of reassurance to smokers. Filters have been dubbed

“the deadliest fraud in the history of human civilisation”.

Most filters contain single-use plastics and are a major environmental hazard, costing UK local authorities around £40 million a year to clean up. Cigarette filters are the most littered item in the world. In the UK they make up 66% of all littered items. Biodegradable alternatives may therefore feel like an attractive solution, but biodegradable filters do not eliminate environmental concerns. They have been shown to be equally toxic to marine and freshwater life when littered in our rivers and seas. They take between two and 14 years to decompose, and they often do so only in very particular conditions, such as under high temperatures. Biodegradable filters could also lead to an increase in guilt-free littering through smokers believing that discarded butts do not have an environmental impact.

However, the greatest risk of biodegradable filters is that they allow tobacco companies to continue with filter fraud and greenwashing in order to rehabilitate their reputation. The best policy, therefore, is to ban all filters. It would mean smokers smoking filterless cigarettes, which, I remind the House, are no worse for their health. It would incentivise quitting, which is the best way to tackle tobacco-related litter and pollution, and it would put people off starting smoking—something of which I am sure everyone in this Chamber would be in favour.

Ending the sale of filters would remove the fraud being perpetrated on smokers that by using a filter they are protecting their health. We banned descriptors such as “light” and “mild”, because they gave false comfort to smokers that they were using safer products and inhibited them quitting. We should do the same again by banning filters, ensuring that those who smoke do not do so because of a belief that their cigarette is safer. Recent ASH polling showed that only 25% of the public is able to correctly identify that filters have no health benefit. The Government should be bold in addressing these misconceptions for the benefit of public health and take the opportunity of a ban to highlight the harms of tobacco.

A ban on filters is an opportunity to protect the environment and secure health benefits. The impact of any ban should be maximised by a strong communications campaign to educate smokers and the wider public about filter fraud.

Briefly, amendments 86 and 87 flag the need for the Government to consider the matter of the sale of bundles of tobacco papers and filters, which could be seen as smoking starter kits. Some supermarkets offer these bundles at only a small cost above the price of the tobacco alone. They are convenient and cost-saving for smokers. That undermines the public health motivation for increasing the price of tobacco products.