Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Lord Murray of Blidworth Excerpts

Tuesday 24th February 2026 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Murray of Blidworth]

1: Clause 1, page 1, line 5, leave out “born on or after 1 January 2009” and insert “under the age of 21”
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to remove the generational ban for tobacco products in England and Wales by raising the age of sale to 21.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to all my amendments in this group, which is all of them barring Amendment 203. I thank my noble friend Lord Naseby, who has signed all my amendments.

The amendments all do the same thing: they would remove from the necessary places in the Bill the generational smoking ban—that is, the prohibition on tobacco sales to all those born after 1 January 2009—and replace it with a fixed age of sale of 21. In my view, this policy was wrong when it was adopted by my party in government, and it is still wrong now.

In asking noble Lords to support this amendment, I will make six points. The first is in relation to prohibition. A generational ban may sound like a progressive step to protect public health, but it is de facto prohibition, and there remains no evidence anywhere in the world that prohibition of a long-standing legal product has ever worked. In time, this policy will result in the termination of a legally controlled, highly regulated, highly taxed industry, which will be replaced by an illegal, uncontrolled, unregulated, untaxed criminal bonanza.

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The noble Baroness’s amendment also seeks to raise public awareness of the harms of smoking and the benefits of quitting. We are committed to supporting and promoting smoking cessation. I hope that noble Lords have seen or heard our most recent national stop smoking campaign, launched earlier this month. This campaign is in addition to more than £150 million of ring-fenced funding to local stop smoking services each year until 2028-29. I hope that your Lordships’ House can understand why the Government will not accept these amendments and that the noble Lord, Lord Murray, will now feel able to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

My Lords, what an excellent debate showing your Lordships’ House at its best, with superb speeches on both sides of the argument. It would be invidious to list them, so I will not. I thank the Minister for her reply and her tolerance of my points throughout Committee and Report on the Bill.

Three thoughts occurred to me during those speeches. The first related to the point first raised by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, who is a man to whom I listen very carefully. He tried to draw an analogy between my amendment and the ban on heroin, or the requirement for people to wear seat belts in a motor car or a helmet when riding a motor cycle. That is, however, to ignore the fact that there is always a balancing exercise in deciding whether to ban something. One of the factors to consider is proportionality. We know from the excellent speeches we have heard this evening that what the Government propose by the Bill is untested and a gamble, not only with the lives of people who may take up smoking but with the livelihoods of shopkeepers and many involved in the retail trade. This policy is not properly thought through, and I am afraid that the analogy made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, does not satisfy me that my reasoning is flawed.

The second thought that occurred to me as I listened to the speeches of the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, and the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, is that I am always astonished that they retain the use of “liberal” in the title of the Liberal Democrat party. Having heard their speeches, it is surely redundant.

My third thought was during the excellent speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley. She said that freedom is not something to be embarrassed about. I very much hope, if the noble Baroness has yet to order her coat of arms from Garter, that she uses that redounding phrase as her motto. With that ringing in your Lordships’ ears, I beg to test the opinion of the House.