Health Bill [HL]

I support these two amendments, in particular Amendment 107A, to which I have put my name. I was particularly struck by a part of Amendment 104 on which we have not dwelt very much, which makes an important reference to smuggled tobacco. That issue needs a lot of attention. We have all been making personal confessions about the problems and challenges that we have faced. All I can say is that we give up smoking in different ways. I was sitting with a pipe, to which I had progressed, one day, when its bowl dropped into the pint of beer in front of me. I said: "This is clearly a message from the gods. One or the other has to stop". The beer did not. That is all I can say, and I have hardly smoked since. I was fortunate to have had a traumatic experience of that kind which brought my smoking to a halt. What strikes me about the general tenor of the discussion is that there has been a lot of wisdom, because many factors bear in on the whole issue of smoking. I have an abiding affection for the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, with whom I was privileged to share a desk for many years downstairs, before he decided to go off on an independent line on politics. Never once, as a committed smoker, did he ever inflict his smoking habits aggressively on me. He was extremely sensitive—