Steve Brine is Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Childcare and Early Education and is the MP for Winchester.
Two-thirds of adults in Britain back the Government’s smoking ban plan, including nearly three-quarters of Conservative voters, in a representative poll carried out by YouGov for ASH.
As public health minister, I put my weight behind the Smokefree 2030 ambition to make smoking obsolete, which was set out in the Prevention Green Paper. It has taken time for the green paper to be turned into a plan of action, but the Prime Minister’s commitments to stamp out smoking for good, are just what’s needed to put us on track.
The smokefree generation law backed up by investment in the measures needed to help adult smokers escape their addiction are vital in securing the long-term viability of the NHS. Shocking new statistics published this week show that every day 350 young adults aged between 18 and 25 start smoking regularly. Having started, on average it takes thirty attempts to stop, and many never succeed, with two out of three people who do not manage to quit dying prematurely due to smoking.
Henry Hill is right that death comes to us all, but smokers are three times as likely as non-smokers to die in middle age, after years of sickness and disease putting unnecessary burdens on our NHS, and damaging productivity. Smoking is responsible for over 1,100 hospital admissions every day, 9 in 10 cases of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, and 3 in 20 cases of cancer. People who get sick from smoking don’t just need healthcare, they also lose time off work, suffer smoking-related lost earnings and unemployment, and require social care on average ten years earlier than non-smokers.
Harry Phibbs asserts that raising the age of sale will lead to an increase in illicit and damage small businesses. But where is his evidence? Raising the age of sale one year every year will have an incremental effect, why would it increase illicit trade. Indeed when the age of sale rose to 18 in 2007 it had no impact on the illicit market while smoking rates in 16 and 17 year olds fell by 30 per cent.
Arguing regulations won’t work is straight from the playbook of the tobacco transnationals. No longer credible lobbying governments on their own behalf, they fund front groups to argue their case. But industry-funded trade bodies are not representative of the majority of retailers. After the ban on tobacco displays and plain packaging came into force a survey of over 500 independent retailers found three quarters said the regulations either had no, or a positive impact on their business, and more than half wanted existing regulations strengthened further.
Two decades ago those opposing the ban on smoking in public places also argued that it was unenforceable. They were wrong then and they’re wrong now. After the smoking ban came into force in 2007 81 per cent of business decision makers thought it was ‘a good idea’ and there was 98 per cent compliance from the outset. Does anyone serious really want to go back to smoking in public places unfettered?
I would contest that, in a publicly funded health system, the state has a right and indeed the responsibility to act on population level public health prevention measures. This is a classic example of that.
A decade later not only did the vast majority of the public support smokefree laws but also more than half all smokers with fewer than a quarter opposed. Increasingly pubs have become family-friendly places selling food as well as alcohol to the benefit of us all. Pubs that start selling food are reclassified from pubs to restaurants and although the number of pubs went down by 52 a week, the total number of premises licensed to sell alcohol increased went up by 80 a week.
The tobacco epidemic is already nearing its end and there is strong public support for measures to hasten its arrival. The public understand that the Government’s smoking ban will save lives and improve the health and wellbeing not just of individuals and their families but also of our economy. That is why the overwhelming majority of the public and parliamentarians support the legislation.
The Government should delay no further in putting the Bill to parliament to ensure it can become law before the general election.
Steve Brine is Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Childcare and Early Education and is the MP for Winchester.
Two-thirds of adults in Britain back the Government’s smoking ban plan, including nearly three-quarters of Conservative voters, in a representative poll carried out by YouGov for ASH.
As public health minister, I put my weight behind the Smokefree 2030 ambition to make smoking obsolete, which was set out in the Prevention Green Paper. It has taken time for the green paper to be turned into a plan of action, but the Prime Minister’s commitments to stamp out smoking for good, are just what’s needed to put us on track.
The smokefree generation law backed up by investment in the measures needed to help adult smokers escape their addiction are vital in securing the long-term viability of the NHS. Shocking new statistics published this week show that every day 350 young adults aged between 18 and 25 start smoking regularly. Having started, on average it takes thirty attempts to stop, and many never succeed, with two out of three people who do not manage to quit dying prematurely due to smoking.
Henry Hill is right that death comes to us all, but smokers are three times as likely as non-smokers to die in middle age, after years of sickness and disease putting unnecessary burdens on our NHS, and damaging productivity. Smoking is responsible for over 1,100 hospital admissions every day, 9 in 10 cases of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, and 3 in 20 cases of cancer. People who get sick from smoking don’t just need healthcare, they also lose time off work, suffer smoking-related lost earnings and unemployment, and require social care on average ten years earlier than non-smokers.
Harry Phibbs asserts that raising the age of sale will lead to an increase in illicit and damage small businesses. But where is his evidence? Raising the age of sale one year every year will have an incremental effect, why would it increase illicit trade. Indeed when the age of sale rose to 18 in 2007 it had no impact on the illicit market while smoking rates in 16 and 17 year olds fell by 30 per cent.
Arguing regulations won’t work is straight from the playbook of the tobacco transnationals. No longer credible lobbying governments on their own behalf, they fund front groups to argue their case. But industry-funded trade bodies are not representative of the majority of retailers. After the ban on tobacco displays and plain packaging came into force a survey of over 500 independent retailers found three quarters said the regulations either had no, or a positive impact on their business, and more than half wanted existing regulations strengthened further.
Two decades ago those opposing the ban on smoking in public places also argued that it was unenforceable. They were wrong then and they’re wrong now. After the smoking ban came into force in 2007 81 per cent of business decision makers thought it was ‘a good idea’ and there was 98 per cent compliance from the outset. Does anyone serious really want to go back to smoking in public places unfettered?
I would contest that, in a publicly funded health system, the state has a right and indeed the responsibility to act on population level public health prevention measures. This is a classic example of that.
A decade later not only did the vast majority of the public support smokefree laws but also more than half all smokers with fewer than a quarter opposed. Increasingly pubs have become family-friendly places selling food as well as alcohol to the benefit of us all. Pubs that start selling food are reclassified from pubs to restaurants and although the number of pubs went down by 52 a week, the total number of premises licensed to sell alcohol increased went up by 80 a week.
The tobacco epidemic is already nearing its end and there is strong public support for measures to hasten its arrival. The public understand that the Government’s smoking ban will save lives and improve the health and wellbeing not just of individuals and their families but also of our economy. That is why the overwhelming majority of the public and parliamentarians support the legislation.
The Government should delay no further in putting the Bill to parliament to ensure it can become law before the general election.