Beccy Cooper MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 7 Jan 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill (Second sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Thank you, Minister, for that rousing speech. I will keep it brief. I want to come back to smoke-free spaces. As you say, the Bill will lead to smoke-free spaces outside schools, children’s playgrounds and hospitals. That is all very laudable and evidence based, but it is important, if you can, that you address the issue around hospitality settings. Please state to the Committee why they are not in the Bill as it stands. Andrew Gwynne: We wanted to have a proportionate approach. We recognise the difficulty that the hospitality sector has gone through and is in. We listened to the voices of concern. I cannot speak for ministerial colleagues in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but, as far as England is concerned, we decided that we wanted to target outdoor smoke-free places to areas where children and the most vulnerable people are likely to be. That leads to the logical conclusion that we should target the outside of hospitals, where a lot of vulnerable people go through the doors, outside schools and outside children’s playgrounds.

• 7 Jan 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill (First sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q My question is around inequalities. How effective or otherwise do you think the Bill will be in reducing inequalities? Are there any areas of the UK that have specific challenges related to tackling smoking prevalence that you would like to highlight? Professor Sir Michael McBride: That is a really important question. We talked before about the blatant marketing of tobacco and vapes. There is also the preying of the industry on those more socioeconomically deprived areas. If we look at smoking rates in those more socio- economically deprived areas, they are two to three times higher than in less socioeconomically deprived areas. If we consider the death rate from smoking-related conditions, it is twice as high. If we look at lung cancer rates, they are two and a half times as high in those areas. That is a direct consequence of the smoking incidence in more socioeconomically deprived areas. The health inequalities associated with the consumption of tobacco are significant and great. If we look at smoking in pregnancy and all its consequences in terms of premature birth, stillbirth and low birthweight, we see that smoking among women from more socioeconomically deprived areas is four and a half times higher than among those in less socioeconomically deprived areas. The health inequalities argument and the case to be made for addressing that within the Bill is huge. This is an opportunity that we must not pass up to narrow the adverse health consequences. Professor Sir Gregor Ian Smith: It is my very clear view that the provisions within the Bill will help us to tackle some of the inequalities associated particularly with tobacco smoking. If I look at the situation in Scotland, 26% of our lowest socioeconomic group are smokers, compared with 6% of our highest socio- economic group. The gradient that Sir Michael has spoken about in terms of the subsequent tobacco-related disease that those groups then experience is really quite marked, whether that be cardiovascular disease or the numerous cancers associated with smoking. All of those can be addressed by trying to tackle the scourge of these tobacco companies preying on more vulnerable groups within our society, whether that be those who experience socioeconomic circumstances that are much more difficult and challenging for them, or whether that be particular groups that are more likely to experience mental health conditions. All of these must be tackled; people must be assisted not to develop addictions that lead to lifelong smoking and problems with their health thereafter. I am very clearly of the view, both in terms of smoking and, it is important to say, of vaping, that the targeting of those groups that creates those inequalities within our society is something that this Bill can address.

• 7 Jan 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill (First sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Thank you so much to our witnesses for being here. I just want to take you back to a conversation you were having with a previous questioner about smoking cessation in hospitals. Could you give us your thoughts about vaping being available in hospitals, to allow people in hospitals who are quitting smoking, or who want to continue quitting, to continue vaping? Our CMOs talked about a smoke-free place being a vape-free place. What are your thoughts about vaping in hospitals—where it is a smoke-free place—and about access to vapes? Suzanne Cass: In Wales, we have obviously implemented smoke-free legislation. We have seven different health boards and various approaches to that legislation when it comes to the implementation alongside vaping. When it comes to indoor spaces, there is already a huge amount of compliance with voluntary bans. People generally do not smoke in indoor spaces, so there is already that public consensus in those areas. When it comes to the outdoor spaces, there is not necessarily a consistent approach across Wales regarding smoking and vaping, which can cause confusion among the public. I think that we need to be considering this very carefully, in terms of providing as much support to smokers as possible in these areas. We need to be considering exemptions to vape-free spaces, particularly in smoke-free spaces in hospital settings, mental health units and places where vulnerable patients who smoke are situated. That would be the message: we need to really consider those exemptions. Sheila Duffy: In Scotland, we put medicinally therapeutic products front and centre with smoking cessation. Smoking cessation is vital, but we need to remember that there is no medicinally licensed e-cigarette product anywhere in the world, and that medicinally licensed products have a very different set-up. With e-cigarettes, you are talking about more than 30,000 different variants listed with the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, and four or five generations of devices, with very different health profiles. Most of the comparisons are made with the toxins in tobacco, but there are different additional toxins in e-cigarettes, and there is new research—for example, AI modelling—on the impacts of heating some of the chemicals in e-cigarettes to vapour point, where they produce highly toxic outcomes. We need to bear that in mind. We also need to look at the research on air quality, because e-cigarettes conclusively contain the kind of particulates that we worry about for air quality and that cause harm to health. I think that that is an issue arguing for vape-free spaces. In Scotland, we are supporting people to quit smoking in whatever way works for them—we are supporting individuals—but we are actively recommending only medicinally licensed products, because they have that context of appropriate use, safety and quality control, which e-cigarettes do not have.

• 7 Jan 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill (First sitting) · Hansard source

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  I declare an interest as a public health consultant and a member of the British Medical Association.