Member

The noble Lord, Lord Murray, referred to the proliferation of the drugs trade, I believe, with it somehow being supported by people buying black-market tobacco. I assure him—I am sure that he is aware of this—that this Government take the threat posed by drugs very seriously. We are committed to preventing drug use and abuse, but there is no evidence to suggest that changing the age of sale for tobacco will lead to an increase in drug use. Again, I refer back to when the age of sale for tobacco was raised from 16 to 18: we actually saw a decrease in drug usage. It is the case that those in the smoke-free generation will never be sold tobacco legally; we do not expect that to have an impact on drug usage by that group, nor have we previously seen evidence that it will.