LABELLING OF CIGARETTE PACKETS (Hansard, 10 June 1969)

§ Dr. John Dunwoody (Falmouth and Camborne)
I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide for the labelling of cigarette packets in such a way as to inform the public of the health hazards resulting from cigarette smoking. Last year in Great Britain 32,010 men and women died as a result of lung cancer. This is a disease which is largely preventable. A great majority of these deaths occured because these people were smoking cigarettes, and in many cases smoking cigarettes heavily. This is the greatest public health problem, in my view, that this country has ever had to face. We have a steadily rising toll year by year from diseases that are linked to cigarette smoking.
In my Bill I am attempting to produce at least one more weapon in the fight against these diseases. Warning notices printed on the cigarette packets that are sold in the country will bring home to at least some of those smoking cigarettes the personal risks that they are running. The magnitude of the problem we face is almost beyond comprehension. Indeed, a sense of apathy and helplessness seems to have arisen. People seem to be hypnotised into inactivity by the size of the problem—32,000 people every year, 88 men and women dying of lung cancer alone, every day of the week, every week of the month every month of the year.
This would mean, for each Member of the House, that we lose 50 of our constituents from this cause in a year, one constituent every week. Five times as many people are killed by lung cancer as are killed on the roads in Britain today. These are not old men and women; on average, they are dying 13 to 14 years earlier than they would from other causes, many of them in the prime of life. It is not only cancer which cigarettes cause, but diseases like bronchitis, heart diseases and gastric troubles. There must be few of us in this House who do not know of friends or relatives or of political colleagues whose lives have been cut short as a result of cigarette smoking.
1253 I want, in my Bill, to label cigarette packets with warning notices in an attempt to give a personal direct warning to the individual. There is no doubt that the great majority of people accept that there is a health risk from smoking cigarettes, but hardly anyone accepts that it applies to him or her personally. It is always the other man or the other woman who will run into trouble. I want to label cigarette packets because this is the sort of area that has not so far been covered by Government expressions of intentions to legislate and it is something where private Members can play a part.
The Government are committed to introduce legislation to take powers to ban cigarette coupons and to control or ban other advertising. They are empowering themselves to forbid or limit certain sorts of advertisements and to limit expenditure on the advertising of cigarettes. All of this I welcome. To me, it is a tragedy that nothing has been done since the Government announced their intentions in October, 1967. The tragedy is felt particularly by the families of the 50,000 men and women who have died of those diseases since the Government expressed their intention to bring in legislation.
In my Bill I propose to label cigarettes in a direct and unambiguous way, with wording that is easily understandable. I propose that cigarette packets should be labelled thus: Danger. These cigarettes can harm your health. Cigarettes are known to cause lung cancer, bronchitis and heart disease. I also want the Bill to give to the Minister responsible the power to vary the wording from time to time. For example, perhaps we could consider whether the tar content of the various tobaccos used in cigarettes should be described on the packets. We should certainly seriously consider whether the weight of the tobacco in the cigarettes should not also be on the outside of the packet.
In my Bill I want to make this provision for the whole of the United Kingdom and I want the Bill, when it comes into force, to be enforced for a period of five years to give us a reasonable length of time to see what effect the proposal will have. I want to have a waiting period of six months, an interval of six months 1254 after the Measure is passed and before it comes into force to give the industry time to set up the machinery and the printing, and so on.
The question that is inevitably asked is: what effect would a proposal like this, if it were introduced, have? We have to be frank—we do not know. The only experience that we can quote from is that of the Americans. It is certainly true to say that neither my Bill nor the other public health education measures that have been introduced in America, or, for that matter, in this country, have had any dramatic effect on cigarette consumption. Nevertheless, in 1968 cigarette consumption fell in the United States for only the second year in the last 15 to 20 years.
I believe that it fell—and this is the opinion of authorities in America—because of the combined propaganda offensive that has been launched in that country. One element in this offensive is the labelling of cigarette packets with warning notices, although I feel that the American warning notice is a rather innocuous one and not as strong as that which I am proposing. It is certainly impossible for anyone to deny that this may well have had a beneficial effect and it is inconceivable that the sort of warning notice that I am talking about could have any harmful effect.
The other set of objections raised are that there are practical difficulties to do with the printing of notices on the outside of packets and the cost involved. I do not accept this. Many of the cigarette producers are today printing warning notices on the outside of the packets of cigarettes that they are exporting to the United States. I ask leave to bring in the Bill because I believe that it can have a significant effect on the most dangerous and deadly form of addiction in Britain today. I ask leave to bring in the Bill so that Parliament can commit itself on this issue and signify to the Government and the country its very great and real concern at the enormous misery, suffering and death that is caused in Britain today by smoking cigarettes.

§ Mr. Robert Cooke (Bristol, West)
rose—

§ Mr. Speaker
Order. Does the hon. Member wish to oppose the Bill?

§ Mr. Cooke
Yes.

§ Dr. M. S. Miller (Glasgow, Kelvingrove)
Shame.

§ Mr. Cooke
The hon. Member says "Shame" because I rise to oppose the Motion. I would like to explain my position straight away. I am a nonsmoker, an anti-smoker and I have a great deal of sympathy with the undoubtedly pure motives of the hon. Member for Falmouth and Camborne (Dr. John Dunwoody).
The House would be wrong to give the hon. Member leave to bring in the Bill, although I suppose that it does not make much difference one way or the other now, from the point of view of his chances of success, because he has brought in his Bill very late in the Session. This must be to some extent a publicity opportunity for the views he holds. I believe that the House would be wrong to associate itself, to wholly commit itself to a scheme which appears to deal only with part of the problem.
The hon. Member particularly mentions cigarettes, and gave details of what he wants printed on the cigarette packet. He could easily have told us what he thought about the other forms of tobacco, and I wonder why he did not. We are told that pipes and cigars are less noxious to smokers and that possibly the risks of getting some of the ailments which the hon. Gentleman mentioned are smaller, but surely these instruments of torture—as they are to the non-smoker—the pipe and the cigar, are far more noxious for those who do not want the benefit of the activities of the smoker. The hon. Gentleman should have brought that within the scope of his proposed Bill.
I am not entirely happy about the wording which he proposes to put on the cigarette packet. We should strive to see that people do not indulge in this stimulus to excess—[Interruption.] I know that we must be careful to stick within the rules, but it is the excessive use of these stimulants which is generally accepted to 1256 be dangerous to the users. They are more dangerous to some people than to others, and the individual's doctor might know more about it than someone who laid down the printing on a packet.
The hon. Gentleman might have mentioned the immense amount of time, money and energy which is put into research into the effects, good and bad, of tobacco. I hold no brief for the tobacco companies, but I took the trouble to find out how much was spent on research. A total of £1 million is invested in the Tobacco Research Council's laboratories. £1 million a year is spent on research through the Council and a further £1 million a year in companies' own laboratories or on work which the companies support outside. A good quarter of this work is research into lung cancer in particular. Hardly any research projects which ask for assistance are turned down, and, if they are, it is on scientific and not financial grounds.
The hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to the undoubted danger of tobacco stimulants, but he has not painted the whole picture and it would be wrong for the House to attach undue significance to his speech. It would be utterly pointless to give him leave to introduce a Bill which could not possibly succeed this Session.