HC Deb 10 July 1990 vol 176 cc159-60W
Mr. Bright

To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on the MORI social research unit's report to the health education authority on smoking by children between the ages of nine and 15 years.

Mr. Dorrell

We welcome the report which was undertaken as part of the Health Education Authority and Department of Health's joint teenage smoking programme. It should prove valuable both in managing the programme and in planning its future direction. The report confirms the evidence that smoking among schoolchildren has fallen since 1984. However, the figures remain disturbingly high, and the aim of the teenage smoking programme, to which the Government have committed over £2 million a year, is to achieve further significant reductions.