Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the Royal College of Physicians’ report, Smoking and health 2021: a coming of age for tobacco control?, published in 29 April 2021, recommendation to provide smoking cessation services on an opt-out basis to all smokers at any point of contact with the NHS.

The NHS Long Term Plan commits to delivering National Health Service-funded tobacco treatment services to all inpatients, pregnant women and people accessing long term mental health and learning disability services; which are expected to be opt-out services.