Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)

My Lords, I rise to welcome government Amendments 14 and 15, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister. I will not go through them in detail, as I am sure she will, but I note that this is a lovely practical example, and all credit to the Government that their campaigning has worked. We heard in Committee from both Action on Smoking and Health and the Mental Health and Smoking Partnership about the need for an exemption in in-patient mental health settings for vaping vending machines. The Government have clearly listened, and this is an example of how this all should work, so let us applaud and highlight that. I support Amendment 16, which the noble Earl, Lord Russell, has just introduced. The ban on disposable vapes is clearly being widely, almost universally, got around. The noble Earl spoke about producer responsibility. Well, we have a profoundly irresponsible industry that is behaving in ways that have serious health and environmental impacts. I spent most of this afternoon hosting an event for the National Association of Local Councils. As soon as I said I was leaving to do the Tobacco and Vapes Bill, the reaction was, “Waste!” That is understandable. Let us look at some figures from Biffa on three recycling facilities, in Suffolk, Teesside and London. Before the ban on single-use vapes came in, they saw an average of 200,000 vapes mixed in with general waste; after the ban came in, that went up by about 3%. There was perhaps a rush of material being sold in that immediate period, but from everything we are hearing, the waste problem is still enormous, and the risk of these lithium batteries exploding and catching fire in waste lorries and recycling centres is absolutely enormous. We need more action on public health, too. I spoke to a young person today who said, “Well, I’m a bit confused about how vaping relates to health and cigarettes”. Young people are not getting a clear message, and they are being sold these things everywhere. This amendment is saying we need to keep a watch on this and be ready to catch whatever the industry does next, because we know big tobacco is profoundly irresponsible. As the noble Earl said, this is perhaps not the exact way to do it, but we need to make sure we hear from the Government that they are prepared to take action against big tobacco at any time.