Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that tobacco companies have no involvement in (a) smoking cessation services and (b) public health campaigns.

The United Kingdom is a signatory to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). The Government takes very seriously its treaty obligations, including the commitment under Article 5.3 to protect public health policies with respect to tobacco control from commercial and other vested interests of the tobacco industry. It expects all public bodies to follow comply with the FCTC Secretariat’s guidance on this Article.

To remind the National Health Service of this commitment, NHS England issued a note to clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) in the CCG bulletin dated 26 July 2018. Public Health England (PHE) has also written to local authorities and Directors of Public Health advising against such partnerships, a message reiterated in the PHE blog. The blog is available to view at the following link:

https://publichealthmatters.blog.gov.uk/2018/01/05/duncan-selbies-friday-message-5-january-2018/