Health Bill [HL]

I am pleased to add my support to both these amendments, which are similar and have a common aim. I again declare an unpaid interest as a trustee of Action on Smoking and Health and as a patron of the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, drew attention to the need for more research on ways to encourage people to stop smoking. Greater effort should also be made to determine the causes of lung cancer. It is very easy to say that it is a self-inflicted smoking disease and therefore that there is no point in carrying out research on it. However, that is not entirely the case. A lot of medical research is carried out—a lot is carried out at the University of Liverpool—into the causes of lung cancer, particularly as regards its prevalence. It is done very much on a shoestring. There is very little funding for that research from the Department of Health. However, it is an important part of a complete strategy to tackle smoking. As others have said, we have made remarkable progress in the 11 years since Smoking Kills was published. The fact that smoking prevalence in England is now down to 22 per cent, compared with between 25 and 30 per cent 20 years ago, shows that the measures we have pushed through Parliament have made a terrific difference; for example, the introduction of the ban on tobacco advertising and sponsorship and the major reforms introduced in the most recent Health Act. However, although these prevalence rates are good for those of us who like going to restaurants, bars or public places and being in a smoke-free environment, they mask the fact that the social inequalities around the smoking prevalence figures are still enormous. Smoking prevalence rates are still 60, 70 or 75 per cent in some communities, particularly poor, working-class areas in the north of England. The message has not got through to them. A new, comprehensive strategy must take account of smoking inequalities and address communities where that is a real issue. Certainly, one of the most important parts of a strategy is what we are attempting to do in this Bill, which is to discourage young people from starting smoking. Some countries have achieved dramatic reductions in that regard. Canada and New York were mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Patel. Canada went from a prevalence of 30 per cent in 1990 to 19 per cent in 2006, and there is a prediction that it could go as low as 12 per cent by 2011. That shows what can be done if you address your mind to it. However, any action has to be taken across all sections of the community and, in particular, it must address the poorer sections of the community to whom normal health education messages are not getting through. I hope very much that we will see a new strategy document from the Government. We need to bring Smoking Kills up to date and we need to look at new ways of encouraging people not to start and to give up if they are addicted. Smoking is a legal activity, it is what people want to do, and there is nothing in these measures or in the Bill to prevent that. However, we have a duty to try to help people to give up and we also have a duty to help children not to start smoking. A comprehensive strategy should include those items in particular.