Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)

My Lords, I am sorry, but we will have to wait a few more moments for the noble Baroness’s excellent speech, which I know is coming filled with logic and reason. I want briefly to speak in favour of many of these amendments. I echo the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, on the importance of the validity of the evidence relating to the TPD. Does the Minister feel that this legislation is in the spirit of the Windsor Framework? It may be technically in line with it, but is it in the spirit of it to have two totally different trading environments on the island of Ireland? I am not sure whether information relating to the potential objections from member states to this is published and can be accessed. What can the Government tell us about the objections and the information that we can gather around that? If the Government will not accept these clear, simple and reasonable amendments, why not? Creating a smoke-free generation is extremely groundbreaking and novel, fundamentally trampling on the human rights of an adult to make a free decision. This is seismic, though I disagree entirely with it. Many in the Committee believe in this and I have the greatest respect for the Minister, but it is a significant move away from all the liberties that this Parliament and Parliaments over many centuries before us have tried to protect. If we go down that path, it is important that there is true validity, that every option has been explored and that all the legal issues have been thoroughly explored. If not, you will lose the cultural change, which is what this is about. This is not just a technicality, about trying to change the law to reduce some act. It is a huge cultural change, changing the activities of people in this country. If it is done in a nefarious or opaque way and there are further complexities with endless legal challenges, it will lose its impact. It is important that we are open as to where the problems are and that we understand them better. Simply being told that everything is okay is not good enough. I support the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Murray and will follow on from the well-made points from the noble Earl, Lord Russell. The Better Regulation Framework is an important component of how government functions. I challenge any Minister to explain to me what the Better Regulation Framework actually contains; I am afraid that I have never seen an example of it being properly followed. The key component is not just the nature of proportionality, which many laws simply do not fulfil, but the principle around a review of the effectiveness of regulations, their costs and impact. I have never seen a post-implementation review of any regulations; I am sure that they must exist somewhere, but I do not know how useful they are. In this instance, a review must go into the legislation in a very clear way. We must ask how we will assess whether this has been a success and we must establish now what that means. We should also make sure that we have some type of sunset, to ensure that there is a sense of focus. The noble Earl, Lord Russell, mentioned the costs of implementation. To that I would add—forgive me if I misheard him—the effects on crime; whether the illegitimate marketplace has increased significantly, which we would expect; and whether it has actually worked. The amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Murray has great logic, because if we were to create a smoke-free generation, surely all these excessive regulations, checks and so on will not be required, as no one will be engaging in tobacco usage of any sort. I am aware that some of the amendments that we have put down challenge the principle of creating a smoke-free generation. We believe in them but, in this instance, we are looking at pieces of additional legislation that will make the Bill better. If the Government truly believe in their ambitions, our amendments will make them more likely to succeed.