TOBACCO AND SNUFF (HEALTH HAZARDS) (Hansard, 15 December 1970)

§ Sir G. Nabarro

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to regulate the labelling of packets containing, and to amend the law relating to the advertisement of, manufactured tobacco products, including snuff; to limit the content of tar, nicotine and other harmful substances in manufactured tobacco products, including snuff, when offered for sale; and for purposes connected therewith. An earlier Bill in the last Session called the Cigarettes (Health Hazards) Bill failed through lack of Parliamentary time. In the Sessions before that a Bill moved by the then hon. Member for Falmouth and Camborne Dr. John Dun-woody also failed through lack of Parliamentary time. The Bill proposed today is both a stronger and much wider Bill than either of its predecessors having regard to the climate of contemporary opinion both in Britain and overseas.

The fact is that the great majority of countries of the Western world and indeed many major countries elsewhere, including Russia and Japan, are moving towards restrictive legislation in the matter of tobacco. In this country we have so far carried out only one relatively minor step. That was the banning of advertising for a single tobacco product, cigarettes, on a single medium, namely television.

I would propose, if leave is given to bring in this Bill, three important restrictive measures with regard to the consumption of tobacco, notably cigarettes and including snuff. Those three measures are, first, that a bold, graphic and lurid health warning be printed on the exterior of all containers and packets of cigarettes and tobacco products. Snuff is included for a single, logical reason, namely, that snuff is powdered tobacco and whereas there may not be identical and powerful reasons for supposing that snuff is damaging to health in the same fashion as the inhalation of tobacco smoke, snuff is nevertheless a tobacco product and should be included in the Bill. If the bulk of and majority of informed opinion outside this House and within it decided specifically to exclude snuff at a future stage of the Bill, I would, of course, submit.

The second major feature of the Measure proposed is a critically important one. It is to print on the exterior of 1122 all containers for tobacco and tobacco products, notably cigarettes, the poison content of the manufactured tobacco itself, notably such poisons as tar and nicotine. The third provision which may be introduced into the Bill in Committee if the Government support the Measure, but not otherwise, is a total ban on all advertising by all media of all tobacco products. This is now recommended in many countries, in their respective national legislatures, and is believed to be contained, according to advance statements, in the forthcoming Second Report and Recommendations of the Royal College of Physicians on Tobacco. It is generally believed to be an acceptable measure for containing and eventually restricting the consumption of tobacco, especially in the form of cigarettes.

My reason for believing that this Measure is so important in our contemporary society is the evil influence of tobacco consumption, notably cigarettes, upon human health. There cannot be any reasonable doubt today that there is a direct link between the consumption of tobacco and such dread diseases as cancer of the lung, carcinomas of many kinds and, whether afflicting males or females, coronary and other heart diseases and bronchial ailments of every description. The fact is that the bulk of medical opinion in Britain today confirms that about 100,000 men and women are losing their lives annually, directly or indirectly, as a result of tobacco consumption in all its forms.

I put to the House this afternoon a single feature of that astonishing figure of 100,000 deaths annually on this account. Nobody has yet been able to quantify or put a monetary figure on the cost to the National Health Service of one death out of the 100,000 deaths arising from tobacco consumption, but I aver, with a great deal of support outside the House, notably medical and surgical, that probably the cost of treatment of a lung cancer case by doctors and nurses, and hospitalisation before death, probably aggregates £1,000 per case.

I hear an hon. Member say "At least", and I, too, believe that that figure is an under-estimate, but I put it this afternoon at £1,000 per death for all these facilities. But if that is a true estimate then 100,000 deaths a year would account for an expenditure under the 1123 National Health Service of £100 million, or approximately 5 per cent. of the total National Health Service Vote.

I say that no Government should stand on the sidelines and observe this chronic waste of funds and medical resources as well as the disastrous waste of human life without taking steps to limit it. Of course, in a free society it is impossible to require by Statute that men and women will not smoke. We cannot enact on such a matter. We can only try to persuade; I believe by the general means I have described.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer should listen carefully to these words—I am glad to see that my right hon. Friend is nodding assent. The fact is that this year he collects £1,160 million in Tobacco Duty. Out of that £1,160 million, 87½ per cent., or £1,045 million, is on account of Tobacco Duty derived from cigarettes. So seven-eighths of the duty conies from cigarettes and one-eighth from other forms of tobacco products.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer has a mighty vested interest: it is valid to say that if tobacco consumption reduces, as it would under the proposed Bill, a Chancellor of the Exchequer will lose revenue, but I appeal to my right hon. Friend that human health in Britain is vastly more important to our community, and to all human progress besides, than his immediate and current Revenue in the year I have quoted, vast sums of money though that represents.

For all these reasons, I believe that Britain should lead, not follow, in this context, restrictive legislation on consumption of tobacco and cigarettes. The Bill is supported by eleven other Members representing the maximum permitted number of 12 sponsors for a Bill. Of those, seven are Tory Members, four are Labour Members and one is a Liberal Member. Of the 12 Members, eight are laymen and four are medical doctors. It is therefore an all-party Measure powerfully supported by both medical and lay Members.

§ Mr. Lipton

I oppose the Motion. First, I must declare an interest. I am an honorary member of the Society of Snuff Grinders, Blenders and Purveyors, and I have a very beautifully illuminated testimonial to that effect.

1124 Second, I submit that it is an abuse of process, if not highly irregular and unusual, for an hon. Member introducing a Bill under the Ten Minutes Rule procedure to announce before the Bill is presented that he will abandon one important provision. The hon. Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro) has already indicated that he is now prepared to exclude snuff from the provisions of the Bill. I wonder whether he has secured the consent of the eleven hon. Members who support him to this important alteration.

It is quite clear that the hon. Member has not taken the trouble to acquaint himself with the facts, which are, briefly, as follows. There is no evidence whatsoever to indicate that snuff-taking is harmful. As a matter of fact, snuff-takers are a happy breed of men and women, and if the hon. Member were to take the trouble to examine the criminal statistics he would find that only a minute proportion of the country's criminal population takes snuff.

Probably one of the country's greatest authorities on the subject is Professor D. F. N. Harrison, Doctor of Medicine. Master of Surgery, and a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons. He published an article, Snuff: its use and abuse in the British Medical Journal of 26th December, 1964. I do not know whether the hon. Member took the trouble to read that article before he compiled his Bill. Professor Harrison, who is the head of the Institute of Larynology and Otology, University of London, has not altered any of the views he then expressed. Snuff apparently does not reach the lungs. There is no relation between the taking of snuff and lung cancer.

Though small, the snuff industry is very old and provides consistent employment, without strikes, for a number of working people throughout their lives. Nearly 30 per cent. of the snuff manufactured in this country is exported, and so makes a useful contribution to our export trade. It has no tar content—this is only produced on burning.

Because, quite obviously, the hon. Member has not given sufficient thought to what he is doing in introducing his Bill, and because when the Bill is finally 1125 printed, if ever it is printed, it will be quite different from what it was originally intended to be, I wish to register my opposition. Nevertheless, in order not to waste the time of the House I shall not press my opposition to a Division, on the assumption, the undertaking, that the hon. Member will exclude all reference to snuff when the Bill is dealt with, if ever it is dealt with, in Committee.