UK Parliament / Open data

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Proceeding contribution from Simon Clarke (Conservative) in the House of Commons on Tuesday, 16 April 2024. It occurred during Debate on bills on Tobacco and Vapes Bill.

With respect to my hon. Friend, I said that those drugs destroy communities. There is a profound difference. The ripple effect of illegal drugs is to prompt real social harm to others, because those habits are so destructive that people steal and rob to fund them. Tobacco does not do that. It is obviously extremely bad for people, but it does not drive patterns of behaviour as destructive as those associated with crime. That is a fundamental difference, and it is why we should focus our efforts on stopping those trades, rather than on banning something that has been legal for hundreds of years. We all recognise it carries real medical harms, but it is not, I submit, our job to try to take it away from people. We should rely on education and the tax system, but we should not rely on legislation to tell other people what to do when they are grown adults in a free country.

5.8 pm

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
748 c240 
Session
2023-24
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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