Health Bill

Three weeks ago, we commemorated the 400th anniversary of the gunpowder plot. Received wisdom has it that the plotters against the monarchy were alienated Catholics. More perceptive historians blame a group of 17th century cigarette manufacturers, because a few months before 5 November 1605 His Majesty King James I of England and VI of Scotland issued a decree banning tobacco from his kingdom in the following terms:"““Loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs and in the stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrific Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless””." Clearly, he was not a native of Airdrie and Shotts. And he was not wrong. Four hundred years later, after mounds of medical evidence, tax rises, warnings on packets, laws about sale of cigarettes to children, and bans on advertising, more than 100,000 people a year in the UK still die from smoking-related disease. That appalling total included my own father when I and my sisters were adolescents. Smoking is still the biggest cause of preventable death in our country. It is an addiction that brings misery, illness and bereavement to countless families. It is therefore a political issue of great importance.