Parliament
Questions from ministers and answers (in a fashion) from government departments about vaping and tobacco harm reduction from the House of Commons
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by Dave Cross
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Mary Glindon asked the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the consultation on Creating a smokefree generation and tackling youth vaping, for how long the Department for Health and Social Care plans to consider responses to that consultation before publishing a Tobacco and Vapes Bill.
Andrea Leadsom cleared up any misunderstanding: “Smoking is responsible for around 80,000 deaths a year in the United Kingdom and causes around one in four cancer deaths in the UK. It also costs our country £17 billion a year and puts a huge burden on the National Health Service.”
Brilliant, that’s great Andrea, but that doesn’t say when you’ll publish a Tobacco and Vapes Bill.
“Vaping is rightly used by adults as a tool to quit smoking,” Leadsom continued. “They are substantially less harmful than cigarettes. However, the Government is concerned about the worrying rise in vaping among children, with youth vaping tripling in the last three years and one in five children having now used a vape.”
Noted. You’re being forced to accept that evidence about vaping but you aren’t willing to give up something you believe is happening and move from your position of wanting to ban vapes…but that still doesn’t address the whole Tobacco and Vapes Bill thing.
“This is why the Government is planning to create a smokefree generation by bringing forward legislation so that children turning 14 years old or younger this year will never be legally sold tobacco products, and further crack down on youth vaping by consulting on measures to reduce the appeal and availability of vapes to children,” Andrea Leadsom continued.
Are you still following this? Yes, you’re right, the question was when a Tobacco and Vapes Bill will be published. And yes, it’s a very simple question.
“We have received approximately 25,000 responses to our consultation and will publish a response shortly,” the Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Health and Social Care concluded.
*tumbleweed*
Not only did Andrea Leadsom completely fail to answer the question, she took quite some time doing it.
Unfazed, Labour’s Mary Glindon attempted a second question. She asked the Secretary of State if an Impact Assessment of the proposals made from the consultation will be published.
In other words, Mary Glindon is asking the Department for Health and Social Care if it is going to consider the unintended consequences of banning disposable vapes, taxing vapes, or getting rid of popular flavours of eliquid.
Shall we take bets on how succinctly Leadsom answers the question and if it will even address it?
Andrea Leadsom said: “Smoking is responsible for around 80,000 deaths a year in the United Kingdom and causes around one in four ca…”
Hang on, isn’t this the non-answer to the previous question?
“Vaping is rightly used by adults as a tool to quit smoking. They are substantially less harm…”
Erm, it is, isn’t it. She just repeating the same nonsense.
“This is why the Government is planning to create a smokefree gen…”
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Photo by Luismi Sánchez on Unsplash
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous start-ups to develop content for their websites.
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