Health Bill [HL]

I support the noble Earl, Lord Howe. I, too, have never smoked and have no desire to smoke. However, I consider that this measure infringes people’s liberties to far too great an extent. I, too, have spoken to a small shopkeeper last weekend. I asked him what effect the measure would have on his business. He told me that five small corner shops had already closed near him in the past couple of years and that his shop was one of the few remaining. He said, "I challenge everybody who looks under 25 before I sell them cigarettes—not under 18, not under 21, but under 25. I am fed up with taking the responsibility that is put on me. My sons do not want to take over this shop". I told him that the measure would not affect him until 2013. He said, "I am not worried about it because I will have gone before then. I am not prepared to put up with any more of this pressure. My sons don’t want it. Another small corner shop will shut down". That is something we should worry about, especially in view of what is happening to shops at the moment. Today, I spoke to a friend who works in the tobacco industry and who smokes. I asked him how the measure was affecting him and his friends. He said, "Some of them smoke, some of them don’t, but I go outside the factory to smoke. I used to have a brief break and perhaps have a cigarette or just a cup of coffee. Now we go outside and we have two cigarettes quickly because we don’t know when we’ll ever be able to get outside again". It is a nonsense. It is not limiting the amount that people smoke. I also had a young schoolchild come in this week on work experience. I asked her whether she wished to attend the Committee this afternoon and explained briefly what it was all about. She looked at me and said, "I couldn’t possibly go in that Committee. I would have to stand up and tell them what rubbish they were talking. I am in school. Children bring cigarettes to school. They sell them to each other. They experiment. Most of them will give up by the time they leave, but to think that they go into shops and buy them at their age is absolute nonsense. They get them from home and from various places, but they don’t go into shops and say ‘I’m going to try it’". I said, "Well, they’re going to put curtains up". She said, "Curtains, lovely. Something you can’t have so you tell the child, ‘No, you mustn’t look at that. If you look at that, you’ll be tempted’, so the child is tempted and thinks, ‘What a good idea. I’ll have a go at that. Next time I’m in school and somebody offers me cigarettes, I’ll buy them and try them’. It has the reverse effect. It is absolutely stupid. I wouldn’t be able to sit there and think that adult people who are supposed to be protecting us are doing so". I replied, "Well, the thing is, the Government are very concerned that everyone dies healthy". She said, "Well that makes sense, but what they are trying to do is an absolute nonsense". She added, "I also know that many of my friends go on holiday, buy cigarettes abroad, bring them back, and sell them on to their friends, making a bit of pocket money. A lot of that goes on. As for covering up displays in shops, that is absolute nonsense. You really need to talk to young people before you do anything like that. You’re just tempting us to go further down the road". She does not smoke and has no inclination to do so, but she said that lots of people felt the same way as she did.