Health Bill [HL]

My Lords, I refer to two questions that came up earlier in the debate. One is whether there is any evidence that display at point-of-sale is advertising. We had a lengthy discussion about that in Grand Committee. It is accepted—there is plenty of evidence—that the industry uses display at point-of-sale as a means of advertising. The next question is whether that will affect people, particularly children, and influence whether they take up smoking. The evidence for that was questioned. I, too, was impressed by the evidence presented by Professor Hastings. I did not find it scientifically lacking. The paper that Professor Hastings published is a peer-reviewed piece of research which found that exposure to point-of-sale displays had a significant effect on young people. On the basis of the precautionary principle, it is completely appropriate to introduce a ban on point-of-sale display of tobacco. The evidence shows that the intention to smoke is strongly linked to taking up smoking. The other evidence quoted was by Smee. Smee was the author of a review which showed the link between advertising and smoking, which was the basis for the Government’s introduction of a ban on tobacco advertising a few years ago. Now I come to the issue of whether or not small shopkeepers will lose their jobs. This is getting a bit personal. Although I expected the Gallery to be full of Patels today, it is not, because they are all busy selling cigarettes. Before this debate I telephoned my nephew, who runs a small shop selling, among other things, cigarettes. They were among the Patels who were thrown out by Idi Amin when he threw all the Asians out of Uganda. I asked him, "Today we are going to discuss this amendment, and if the amendment is defeated, you will not be able to display tobacco. Is that going to matter to you?". He said, "Yes, it is". I asked, "Are you going to lose a lot of business?". He said, "I will, but I don’t know how much". I asked him if he was going to go bust and he said, "You must be joking". Of course there might be small shops with small revenues for whom the sale of tobacco might be significant, but I believe that they are resourceful enough to find a means of making sure that they do not lose out on selling all products, including tobacco. I believe that it is right that tobacco display at the point of sale should be banned.