Health Bill [HL]

As someone who was mentioned by the noble Lord, I should say that on most occasions I agree with him, and I enjoyed his interesting and entertaining remarks. The question I posed was this: what is the difference between Northern Ireland traders who support the ban and traders in the rest of the United Kingdom who do not seem to support it? That is quite important because, with respect, too many noble Lords who have spoken in this Committee have talked about the entirety of retailers, but they are not. Northern Ireland retailers support the ban. Again with the deepest respect, I think that the noble Lord has taken us up a cul-de-sac. I am totally opposed to smoking and I have mentioned a certain knowledge of this, but let me relate my most recent experience. Two years ago I spent four weeks in hospital with a serious heart attack. I did not fully realise the significance of smoking for heart attacks but I remember one night not being able to get to sleep on the ward because a guy of 23 on the other side of the ward was crying his eyes out. He had had a very serious heart attack and he was crying his eyes out because he wished he had never started to smoke. He told me that his family were very upset and that his chances for the future were very limited. He had had a serious heart attack at the age of 23 and he had been a heavy smoker. That has helped to form my opinion. Incidentally, I do not mind if people smoke, but they have to smoke in their own time and in their own place and not involve me. This is a country where tobacco is legal and people can smoke, but that is not the issue. The noble Lord is getting slightly confused by suggesting that people can die of passive obesity or passive alcohol, but people can die of passive smoking and that is the important issue. I do not mind smokers smoking; they can smoke in the privacy of their own rooms and their own homes, but they do not have any right to try to kill me and my relations who do not smoke. That is the extremely important issue that makes me a dedicated anti-smoker—that, and the vision of the gentleman of 23 opposite me who felt that his life was terminating because at the age of 12 he started to smoke.