Health Bill [HL]

We have not finished yet. When I objected to the Bill being taken in Grand Committee, I was told, "There will be plenty of time to debate it in Grand Committee". The noble Baroness treated us to a very long explanation as to why this legislation should go through. I very much appreciated that, but I came to the conclusion that she was talking about not a ban on displays but a ban on tobacco, full stop. If it is true, as the Royal College of Physicians has apparently told the noble Baroness, that smoking is more dangerous than cannabis and cocaine, then it should be banned. Let us have a little less hypocrisy. If that is the case and the Government accept that case, they should ban it. They should make tobacco a class A drug. Why do they not do that? Why do they keep coming to us in dribs and drabs, banning this and that, now banning displays and vending machines and what have you? Why are they messing about with it? Why do they not come clean and say that they want a complete ban and bring forward a Bill that would do that? It may very well be that they do not want to do that because there is £10 billion at stake, but let us have the truth. If that is the case, then we can understand why these restrictions come along in dribs and drabs: they want to hang on to the money but they want to bombard the smoker and the tobacco companies with all sorts of restrictions. With regard to the Government’s refusal to talk to the tobacco industry and anyone who is promoted by them or receives promotion from them, do they talk to the drug companies? The drug companies are very well known for giving gifts and so on to GPs to promote some products which have proved to be dangerous, such as thalidomide. It is no good saying "Gosh"; we are having an argument about something which affects 80,000 jobs in the retail sector and 22 per cent of the population who smoke. They are constantly bombarded from one side or the other—if not the Government, then some health authority or whatever. Let us hear from the noble Baroness.