A smoking ban for future generations moved a step closer last night, but Rishi Sunak suffered a blow to his authority after dozens of Conservative MPs voted against it.
The House of Commons voted 383 to 67 in favor of the Prime Minister’s plan to make it illegal for anyone born in 2009 or later to buy tobacco products in Britain.
The legislation, which would effectively ban smoking for future generations by raising the legal age every year, is seen by the Prime Minister’s allies as an important part of his political legacy.
However, the result, which was voted against by 57 Tory MPs – including Kemi Badenoch, a likely future leadership candidate, and five other ministers – underlined the deep divisions within the party, even over Sunak’s flagship policies.
Labor has thrown its support behind the plan, which was unveiled at the Tory party conference in October, helping to get it through the House of Commons. More than a hundred Tory MPs abstained, although some of them will have been absent from the House of Commons for reasons unrelated to the vote.
Badenoch, the business minister, was the only minister to vote against the legislation. She said before the vote that she had “significant concerns” because the legislation meant that “people born one day apart will have permanently different rights.”
She told LBC after the vote: “I don’t think the end justifies the means. The principle I was against was treating adults differently and how that would be enforced. It didn’t feel right to me.”
Five other ministers – Julia Lopez, Alex Burghart, Steve Baker, Lee Rowley and Andrew Griffith – also voted against. Penny Mordaunt, the leader of the House of Commons, was among dozens of Tory MPs who abstained.
Conservative MPs were given a free vote, although Andrea Leadsom, the junior health minister responsible for the bill, contacted some of them to plead the government’s case.
Opposition to the plans was led by former Prime Minister Liz Truss, who told the House of Commons she was “very concerned” that it was “emblematic of a technocratic establishment in this country that wants to restrict people’s freedom”.
Tory critics said the proposal would lead to adults being treated differently based on their age, and was a slippery slope that could lead to a ban on fast food or alcohol. Some MPs argued that the plan would encourage an illegal tobacco trade and would be difficult to enforce.
Among those who voted against the ban were Truss, former business secretary Simon Clarke, former home secretary Suella Braverman and former immigration secretary Robert Jenrick.
Several Tory MPs with ties to the vaping industry spoke out against the bill. Mark Eastwood, the deputy leader of the all-party parliamentary group for Responsible Vaping, argued this would push people from vaping to smoking. Adam Afriyie, who received an award from a vaping industry group last year, said he could not support the proposal because adults would be treated differently based on their age.
The legislation would not ban vaping, but would introduce greater restrictions, especially on marketing vaping to young people.
The smoking ban plan is modeled on proposals from New Zealand, which were withdrawn by a new right-wing government in Wellington earlier this year before coming into effect.
Senior Tories including Sajid Javid, the former health secretary, and Steve Brine, the health committee chairman, spoke in favor of the legislation, saying it would ease pressure on the NHS and free future generations from smoking addictions. Savanta polls released on Tuesday showed 64% of Conservative voters in favor of the plan.
“Can we honestly say that this drug increases personal freedom and freedom? It’s a nonsense argument. Anyone who makes that argument is choosing to stand up for big tobacco, against the interests of their constituents,” Javid told MPs.
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The Guardian revealed this week that tobacco companies were lobbying politicians to oppose the legislation and instead support raising the smoking age from 18 to 21 in a bid to prevent an outright ban.
“Given what we know, it is of course right to protect future generations from this drug and this addiction. Freedom from pain, from disease and inequality is one of the greatest freedoms there is,” Javid said.
Victoria Atkins, the health minister, told the House of Commons before the vote that there was “no freedom in addiction”. “Nicotine robs people of their freedom to choose,” she said. “The vast majority of smokers start when they are young, and three-quarters say if they could turn back the clock they would not have started.”
Labor used arguments from Tory opponents to mock the government, pointing to former Tory ministers’ links to tobacco companies.
Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, told the House of Commons: “Of all the policies the Conservatives have adopted from the Labor Party in recent years, nothing demonstrates our dominance in the battle for ideas better than this latest capitulation.
“We are happy to join Big Health in defense of the nation and we are happy to defend the Minister of Health against the siren voices of big tobacco that we see gathering around our former Prime Minister in the corner of the room.
“A stopped clock is right twice a day, and I agree with the former Prime Minister. This is absolutely a non-Conservative bill, it is a Labor bill, and we are pleased to see the government bringing this forward.”
After the vote, Deborah Arnott, the chief executive of Action on Smoking and Health, said: “Parliament has today begun the process of relegating smoking to the ‘ash heap’ of history.
“However, this is only the first step; the bill now needs to go through committee and another vote before going through the same process in the House of Lords. The passage of the bill must be expedited to ensure its entry into the law before the general election.”