LONDON – The British government’s plan for a historic smoking ban, which aims to stop young people from smoking, was expected to clear its first hurdle on Tuesday, despite vocal opposition from Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party.
The bill, a key policy announced by Sunak last year, would make it illegal to sell tobacco products to anyone born after 1 January 2009. It has the support of the opposition Labor Party and was expected to pass . But Sunak faced rebellion from more libertarian-minded members of his party, who criticized the proposals as “unconservative”.
If passed, the bill would give Britain some of the toughest anti-smoking measures in the world. Officials say this will create modern Britain’s “first smoke-free generation”.
Under the Tobacco and Vapes Act, children who turn 15 this year or younger will never be able to legally sell tobacco. The legal selling age for people in England to buy cigarettes will be raised by a year, every year, until it is eventually illegal for the entire population.
The bill also includes measures to crack down on youth vaping, such as banning the sale of cheap disposable vaporizers and restricting their flavors to prevent children from becoming addicted to nicotine.
It is currently illegal for anyone to sell cigarettes or tobacco products and vaporizers to under-18s across the UK.
Opponents, such as smokers’ rights lobby group FOREST, said the move risks creating a black market and will “treat future generations of adults like children”. Prominent voices within the Conservative Party, including two of Sunak’s predecessors, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, said the plans went against Conservative values by limiting people’s personal freedoms.
The bill was a “virtue-signaling piece of legislation about protecting adults from themselves in the future,” Truss told Parliament during Tuesday’s debate.
Despite the opposition, the bill was expected to comfortably clear its first hurdle during a vote Tuesday by lawmakers in the House of Commons.
The plans are believed to have been inspired by similar policies proposed by New Zealand under former prime minister Jacinda Ardern, but the country’s new coalition government repealed the bill earlier this year.
The government has said smoking will not be criminalized and the gradual changes mean anyone who can legally buy cigarettes now will not be prevented from doing so in the future.
The number of people who smoke in the UK has fallen by two-thirds since the 1970s, but around 6.4 million people in the country – or around 13% of the population – still smoke, according to official figures.
Authorities say smoking causes around 80,000 deaths a year in the UK and remains the leading preventable cause of death, disability and ill health.
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