New date and speakers for presentation of Javed Khan review on tobacco control

Now that Boris has survived to fight another day the business of government can continue, for the moment at least.

Having been postponed two weeks ago because of ‘scheduling issues’ (ie the publication of the Sue Gray report), Javed Khan will now present the recommendations from his ‘independent review’ on tobacco control on Thursday (June 9).

The new date was announced yesterday on Twitter. The most notable change from the original date is the list of speakers which makes me wonder if Khan has been reading this blog.

Following my observation that two of the four speakers listed were members of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Smoking and Health, which is run by ASH, neither appear on an amended list of speakers that still includes junior health minister Maggie Throup and chief medical officer Sir Chris Whitty with 'Others tbc'.

So instead of Conservative MP Bob Blackman and Labour's Mary Foy we now have Andrew Gwynne MP, Labour’s shadow public health minister, and ‘cancer survivor’ Sue Mountain.

It doesn’t mean that Blackman and Foy won’t be involved but I wonder if reference to their close connection with ASH persuaded Khan that they should play a less prominent role. (They could of course be unavailable but that seems unlikely.)

Not that it will make much difference. ASH's tentacles are everywhere. In March, for example, Gwynne tweeted that he was ‘pleased to be asked to say a few words as Labour's Shadow Public Health Minister at @AshOrgUK's 50th birthday event' organised by the APPG on Smoking and Health (ie ASH).

The same event – described here on the ASH website – also featured speeches by Blackman and Throup. Small world.

Ex-smoker Sue Mountain is another familiar name. I won't criticise anyone who has gone through the trauma of cancer and I wish her well but it's worth noting that she has been quoted several times by ASH and other anti-smoking campaigns.

In May 2020 she was quoted in an ASH press release supporting the ban on menthol cigarettes which she used to smoke.

She also featured in another ASH press release calling on Government ‘to make the tobacco manufacturers pay to end the smoking epidemic’.

A tobacco levy is of course expected to be one of Khan's main recommendations, together with raising the age of sale of tobacco to 21 or higher.

Personally I can't wait to see how his proposals differ from those of the APPG on Smoking and Health whose own recommendations, drafted no doubt by ASH and published in June 2021, can be read here.

My guess is they will be very similar indeed.