House rules

Hugely enjoyable evening at the House of Commons on Wednesday as Forest hosted a reception to highlight opposition to the Government’s generational tobacco ban.

Numbers were restricted by the size of the venue but we had a full house including MPs, peers, and parliamentary researchers.

Other guests included representatives of various think tanks and pressure groups including the Institute of Economic Affairs, Adam Smith Institute, TaxPayers Alliance, Consumer Choice Center, Students for Liberty, LSE Hayek Society, and Blue Beyond, a grassroots initiative that engages with young Conservatives.

The day didn’t start well, though, because shortly after I set off to drive to London I got a call from the office of Philip Davies MP.

Philip was sponsoring the event but eight hours before guests were due to arrive - including two from Edinburgh - his office told me there had been a ‘cock-up’ and he was double-booked.

Without a sponsor - who has to be present throughout - the event could not go ahead.

I was assured that a replacement would be found but an hour later I was none the wiser and fearing the worst.

Eventually I got the call I was praying for. Giles Watling, the Conservative MP for Clacton in Essex, had agreed to step in and the event was back on.

Phew!

But that wasn’t the end of the drama. When we arrived at the Palace of Westminster, we were carrying two background banners (each one two metres long when rolled up), plus flyers and beer mats.

One of the banners featured a caricature of Rishi Sunak - the same illustration we have been using throughout our campaign against the generational tobacco ban - and we were told by a member of the security team:

“You can’t have a banner with the prime minister pushing a pram.” 



Seriously? Clearly, these jobsworths are unaware of Britain's centuries old tradition of using caricatures of politicians to make a serious political point.

Anyway, as a result of this our banner was confiscated and I had to pick it up the following day from lost property. (More on that later.)

Fortunately, our flyers and beer mats - which featured the same caricature of the prime minister - were less conspicuous and weren’t spotted so we managed to slip them through security without further mishap.

And so to the reception which began at 7.15 and was supposed to end at 9.00 but it was closer to 10.00 before the last guests left.

Describing the event as ‘lively, going on boisterous at times’, journalist George Gay noted that:

The UK’s proposed generational tobacco products ban was variously described as nuts, insane, ludicrous, mad, illiberal, impractical and petty minded by speakers …

Those speakers were Giles Watling, Baroness Fox, Reem Ibrahim (communications officer at the IEA), and me.

Something else we agreed on was that the Government has far more important things to focus on, at home and abroad, than prohibiting adults from purchasing tobacco. As George also wrote:

Watling, a non-smoker but at one time a 60-Marlboro-a-day man, described the proposed ban as insane and said it was not good for the Conservative Party. There were better things that it should be doing than this piece of legislation.

The idea that there were more important things for the government to be doing was taken up forcefully by Baroness Fox of Buckley, who sits in the House of Lords as a non-affiliated life peer.

After outlining some of the huge and urgent domestic and international issues facing the government, she said she found it unbelievable that the prime minister had dedicated precious legislative time and energy on the most ludicrous anti-smoking law.

You can read George’s full report here (Defending liberty), while Guido has the banner story here.

Postscript: When I returned to get the banner the following day, I had to explain to two policemen at the Cromwell Green entrance what my business was.

I explained what had happened and the nature of the banner and found myself, a 64-year-old man, being given a mini lecture by a policeman half my age on why a banner with an illustration of the prime minister pushing a pram wasn’t suitable to take in to parliament.

For most of my life I have been very respectful of the police, but my patience is wearing thin. In this instance, if the banner wasn’t a security risk, or clearly offensive, I resented being lectured like a naughty schoolboy.

Far more offensive and inflammatory placards and banners have appeared outside Parliament and on the streets of London in recent weeks, and the police invariably turn a blind eye.

But taking a banner with a light-hearted caricature of the PM into parliament for a private event? Unacceptable!

Busted!

I don’t have time to write about it now, but I was one of several hundred people who attended the launch of Popular Conservatism in London yesterday.

I went because I was curious to see what all the fuss was about, and here’s the evidence … caught on camera as Liz Truss swept in to take her seat!

I’m in London again today for tonight’s reception - hosted by Philip Davies MP on behalf of Forest - at the House of Commons.

More on that, and Pop Con, tomorrow.

The week in Westminster

The Sunday Times reports that Liz Truss is launching a new movement, Popular Conservatism, on Tuesday.

According to the paper, several hundred guests are expected at the event in central London, including Nigel Farage, although 'sources' say he has been invited only in his role as a GB News presenter.

Director of the new initiative is Mark Littlewood, former director-general of the Institute of Economic Affairs (pictured above at the Forest Freedom Dinner in 2014).

I should have known something was afoot because on January 26, almost two months after Mark stood down as director-general, the IEA issued a press release announcing that he was moving on completely, even relinquishing the title ‘senior economics fellow’.

I’m guessing that was not unrelated to Mark’s new role running a ‘grassroots movement of popular conservatism’.

Anyway, on Wednesday evening, 24 hours after the launch of Popular Conservatism (aka PopCon), another Conservative MP, Philip Davies, is hosting a rather smaller event at the House of Commons on behalf of Forest.

It’s a reception with speakers, the aim of which is to highlight the breadth of opposition to the generational tobacco ban.

Invited guests include MPs and peers, plus individuals and representatives of groups outside parliament who oppose the ban.

As I say, it's not a large event but the good news is that it is fully subscribed.

I can’t deny I’m a bit jealous, though, because I would love to be organising something on the scale of the PopCon event.

Back in October, after Rishi Sunak’s announcement, I did come up with an idea for a large event to oppose the tobacco ban (part of a broader campaign).

I suggested one of two venues in Westminster - the Emmanuel Centre or Church House, both of which can accommodate 300 people - and among the proposed speakers were Liz Truss and Nigel Farage.

Sadly, we didn’t have the resources to take it any further, hence the more modest event at the House of Commons.

I am nevertheless extremely grateful to Philip Davies for hosting it, not least because this is the second time he has hosted an event for Forest in the House.

The previous time was on July 1, 2008, which was the first anniversary of the public smoking ban in England.

On that occasion he hosted a 'champagne tea party' and we invited MPs and a small group of people for whom the ban had had a major social or economic impact.

As I wrote here, the event exceeded expectations. Including our host, there were 17 MPs plus five peers. Sadly, most of them are no longer in parliament, or have subsequently died.

From that event emerged the Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign that was launched in 2009 with the help of … Mark Littlewood, who was then director of a small classical liberal think tank called Progressive Vision.

Mark was one of a number of speakers that day. Another was … Nigel Farage.

The primary aim of the Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign was to persuade MPs to amend the smoking ban.

That part of the campaign ultimately failed but not before 80+ MPs supported a private member's bill to allow designated smoking rooms in pubs and clubs.

The campaign also featured a reception for 200 people on the terrace of the House of Commons. It's remembered today largely for the appearance of Britain’s greatest living artist. (See David Hockney lights up the House of Commons.)

This week's event may be smaller but it's no less ambitious. Our goal? To stop the generational tobacco ban.

A tall order, certainly, but I've never been one to throw in the towel so we'll give it our best shot until there is nothing more we can do.

Meanwhile, if anyone represents popular conservatism it’s Philip Davies, the Conservative MP for Shipley.

Elected to Parliament in 2005 by the slender margin of 422 votes (defeating the incumbent Labour MP), in 2010 he retained his seat with a greatly increased majority of 9,944 votes.

Although it slipped a little in 2015, and fell to 4,681 votes two years later, he nevertheless increased his share of the vote in 2017, and in 2019 increased his majority to 6,242.

Unlike many MPs who set their sights on ministerial positions and even the Cabinet, Philip’s ambition was always to be a good constituency MP, and in my experience he is also one of the most principled politicians we have.

For example, he has never hidden the fact that he dislikes smoking. Despite that, he has consistently voted against anti-smoking legislation because he is firmly against excessive state intervention.

In fact it’s no exaggeration to say that if there were more Conservative MPs like Philip Davies in parliament both the party and the Government might not be in the mess they are, flip-flopping from one unconservative policy to another.

As for Popular Conservatism, we’ll learn more about it on Tuesday, but I wish it well. The Tories may be toast, election-wise, in 2024 but there’s still the future to fight for.

Below: David Hockney with Greg Knight (now The Rt Hon Sir Greg Knight) MP at the Save Our Pubs & Clubs reception on the terrace of the House of Commons in June 2011

Medical bulletin

I had an appointment with my GP yesterday. It was the first time in a year so it was like an annual check-up.

I have two ongoing issues - high blood pressure and an enlarged prostate. The latter ailment I share with King Charles although mine doesn’t need surgery (yet).

Instead I take two pills a day and if I remember to take both the symptoms are manageable, which is probably all the information you need.

High blood pressure can lead to a stroke, apparently, especially in men my age, so another of my daily pills (I take four in total, including a statin) is designed to reduce it.

For years however it has remained obstinately high, probably due to my weight, but yesterday my GP took my blood pressure and declared it “normal”.

To say we were astonished is an understatement. I even queried whether his monitor was working properly.

The bad news is that, since Christmas, my feet and ankles have experienced mild swelling which is an occasional side effect of one of the pills I have been taking.

My GP has therefore prescribed a weaker version of the same pill but says it will probably result in my blood pressure going up again.

So I currently have a choice. A return to high blood pressure - that can lead to a stroke - or itchy, swollen ankles.

In the meantime, I have been offered a pneumonia jab which I am going to have on Tuesday.

When I am 65, in a few weeks, I also qualify for the shingles vaccine which I will probably have because I had shingles once, in my early twenties, and it was extremely painful.

Fortunately, because I was young and my body could fight it off, I only had it for a month, but I remember an older man - an architect at the Barley Mow Workspace in Chiswick where I then worked - experienced it for 18 months and it was very debilitating.

I thought that if you’ve had shingles once you couldn’t get it again, but my GP said that isn’t the case, so if I get offered a vaccine I’ll take it.

What else? Oh yes, for years I’ve had a lump on one shoulder. An MRI scan in 2022 showed it isn’t a tumour but it’s getting bigger and if I don’t want to end up like Quasimodo I should probably have it removed.

However, because it’s classified as ‘cosmetic’, the NHS won’t touch it and I will have to go private, at considerable cost.

“If it was me I’d have it done,” said my GP, who also had surgery on a similar, albeit much smaller, lump two years ago.

Then again, as he also told me, he got mate’s rates.

He also hinted that I am drinking too much, although he eventually agreed that half a bottle of wine, four days a week, is not excessive.

The conversation did however take me back to when I was a student and all my flatmates, including me, were diagnosed with (mild) alcohol poisoning.

Today I’m far more likely to poison myself with too much caffeine.

The prime minister’s illiberal legacy

Fair play to The Spectator.

The magazine has outdone itself this week with a cover and feature article whose headline says it all: ‘How the Tories gave up on liberty’.

Written by Kate Andrews, the magazine’s economics editor, it should be read by every Conservative MP.

Referring to both the generational tobacco ban and the proposed ban on disposable vapes, she writes:

It’s difficult to take away established rights and legal products from adults who already enjoy them. What this government plans to do instead is to take them away from those who are less likely to complain. You don’t miss what you never knew.

That’s why the proposed legislation is so cowardly. The prime minister is picking on a minority whose numbers (in relation to smoking tobacco) have been in decline for decades and are currently at their lowest recorded levels in every age group.

That’s why we’ve read and heard so little about the generational ban in recent weeks. It won’t affect most people, including existing adult smokers, so few people - including newspaper editors - care.

Those that do are dismissed as a ‘tiny minority of the electorate’ whose views, presumably, are irrelevant.

But Kate Andrews has an answer to that:

More important than any single piece of evidence [about the health risks] is that adults should have the right to make personal choices about how they live their lives. Smokers will die younger on average, but this is a risk they are informed about on every cigarette packet.

Crucially, she adds:

It’s not simply smoking that MPs are about to phase out of existence, but the principle that a person should be allowed to determine his or her own destiny.

If you’re a subscriber, you may have read the article already. If you’re not I urge you to buy a copy and send it to your MP, if he or she is a Conservative.

We can dream, but it may give some pause for thought before many of them vote, with Labour MPs, to ban the sale of tobacco to all future generations of adults in the UK.

PS. One Conservative MP who will almost certainly vote against the ban is Philip Davies. (If he doesn’t I’ll be very disappointed!)

I’m pleased to say that next week Philip is hosting a small reception at the House of Commons to address this very issue.

It’s not a big event but it is already fully subscribed. More to follow …

Poll: Tackling smoking not a top priority

As I reported yesterday, a new poll has found that almost two thirds (64%) of adults in Britain say that when people are 18 and legally an adult they should be allowed to purchase cigarettes and other tobacco products.

In contrast, only a quarter (26%) said they should not be allowed to purchase tobacco products when they are legally an adult at 18, while 10% said 'don't know'.

In a second poll conducted by Yonder Consulting for Forest this month, 2,028 respondents were asked to prioritise a list of ten domestic issues.

The survey was carried out this week (29-30 January) and the results, just in, reveal that:

Improving the health service is the most important priority, followed by tackling crime, and tackling inflation.

Other top priorities are tackling illegal immigration, addressing care for the elderly, tackling climate change, tackling the housing shortage, and reforming and improving the education system.

Tackling smoking and tackling obesity were bottom of the list, as they always are whenever we've asked the public to prioritise a list of domestic issues.

(Tackling alcohol misuse is usually at the bottom of the list too but on this occasion there wasn't space to include it.)

I accept that governments can multi-task but it beggars belief that, at a time when so many issues need to be addressed at home and abroad, a Conservative prime minister has chosen to prioritise raising the age of sale of tobacco (and banning disposable vapes).

See also: The public has spoken but the PM isn’t listening

Red carpet ride

At the age of 64 I finally attended my first red carpet event on Sunday.

Sadly, I didn't walk on the actual carpet, or have my photo taken, but I was very close to it (above).

The occasion was the press night for Plaza Suite, a comedy of marital strife by the late Neil Simon, first performed on Broadway in 1969.

The current production played on Broadway in 2022. Starring Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker (of Sex In The City fame), it has now transferred to the West End for a short (albeit extended) run at the Savoy Theatre.

The reviews have been largely positive (although critics agree that Plaza Suite is showing its age and is not one of Simon’s best) but the three-act play in which Broderick and Parker (who are married in real life) play three different couples in a series of comic vignettes, is arguably incidental to the production’s success.

From the moment they walk on stage and are greeted with warm applause, it’s clear that the audience, many of whom are surprisingly young (in their twenties and thirties), are happy to just witness Hollywood royalty.

To be fair, this gave the show a buzz I’ve rarely experienced at the theatre. The excited chatter in the auditorium before the curtain rose was significantly louder than normal.

Perhaps this was in anticipation of the after party at the Savoy Hotel next door, for which many people had dressed up, but it certainly felt like an ‘event’.

Earlier, in the 'compact' dress circle bar before the show, we enjoyed a complimentary glass of champagne and indulged in some celebrity spotting. My wife recognised two people, one from Poldark, the other from The Forsyte Saga, while I quickly clocked the Scottish actor Bill Paterson.

I’m told that other VIPs included Sheridan Smith, Arlene Philips, Ralph Fiennes, Hannah Waddingham and many more. I’ll be honest, though. I didn’t see any of them because work commitments meant we had to give the after party a miss.

It was nice to be invited, though, and even better to be given a complimentary seat for a production for which tickets are reported to cost up to £300, or £395 for the premium package.

Now that's what I call inflation.

PS. Talking of Sheridan Smith, the last show we saw at the Savoy Theatre was Legally Blonde The Musical in 2010 starring ... Sheridan Smith.

Before that there was a revival of Carousel in 2008, and long, long ago I saw Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance at the same venue.

As for the The Savoy hotel, who can forget that it was in the ballroom of one of London's most famous hotels that we held our Revolt In Style: A Freedom Dinner, five days before the introduction of the smoking ban in England.

If you're interested, the Telegraph wrote about it here (Huffing and puffing: Adam Edwards joins a pack of rebellious smokers and pipemen for a last-gasp celebration of tobacco at the Savoy).

The public has spoken but the PM isn’t listening

A new poll has found that almost two thirds of adults in Britain say that when people are 18 and legally an adult they should be allowed to purchase cigarettes and other tobacco products.

The survey, conducted by Yonder Consulting for Forest, found that 64% of respondents think that if a person can vote, drive a car, join the army, buy alcohol, and possess a credit card at 18, they should also be allowed to purchase tobacco.

Only a quarter (26%) said they should not be allowed to purchase tobacco products when they are legally an adult at 18, while 10% said 'don't know'.

Interestingly, we asked the same question in November and on that occasion 58% said adults aged 18+ should be allowed to purchase tobacco, 32% said ‘should not’, and 10% said ‘don’t know’.

Coincidentally, publication of the new poll coincided with the announcement on Sunday evening that the Government is to proceed with a bill to prohibit the sale of tobacco to future generations of adults, and ban the sale of disposable vapes.

There are also plans to restrict vape flavours, introduce plain packaging for vapes, and change how they are displayed in shops so they don’t appeal to children.

I expected to be busier, media wise, but most reports and interviews (including the handful I did yesterday) focused on the disposable vape ban.

Likewise, the one comment the Press Association picked from the Forest press release issued on Sunday was not about the tobacco sales ban but about vapes.

Guido Fawkes ran a story about the Forest poll here, and it included a direct response from former prime minister Liz Truss:

“This is what I am hearing from people I speak to in my South West Norfolk constituency. People want under-18s to be protected. They don’t want adults’ freedoms to be restricted. I fear this is a slippery slope.”

The former PM’s full reaction to the Government’s announcement that it is pressing ahead with plans to ban the sale of tobacco products to anyone born on or after January 1, 2009, read: 

“While the state has a duty to protect children from harm, in a free society, adults must be able to make their own choices about their own lives. 

“Banning the sale of tobacco products to anyone born in 2009 or later will create an absurd situation where adults enjoy different rights based on their birthdate. 

“A Conservative government should not be seeking to extend the nanny state. This will only give succour to those who wish to ban further choices of which they don't approve. 

“The newly-elected National government in New Zealand is already reversing the generational tobacco ban proposed by the previous administration.

“The Government urgently needs to follow suit and reverse this profoundly unconservative policy." 

Asked about his predecessor’s response, Rishi Sunak is reported to have said, “I don’t think there’s anything unconservative about caring about our children’s health”, which suggests he doesn’t understand the point that opponents of the policy are making.

Of course there’s nothing “unconservative about caring for our children’s health”. But when “our children” are 18 they are legally adults and whilst, as parents, we will continue to care about their health, it is ultimately their choice - not ours - how they live their lives, and what risks they take, and as parents we have to respect that.

The idea that we should dictate our children’s lifestyle long after they have grown up and left home, is absurd.

In one respect however the PM is correct. The policy is not entirely ‘unconservative’ because there is a long history of paternalism in the Conservative Party.

Banning the sale of tobacco to future generations is nevertheless a radical departure for a Tory government that nine months ago dismissed the idea as "too big a departure" and said it wasn't going to pursue it.

Anyway, I’m grateful to Liz Truss for her intervention. Following her short and turbulent period in office it’s easy for people to mock the former PM and criticise anything she says, but I have enormous respect for politicians who stick to their principles, and in this case Truss is doing just that.

After entering Parliament in 2010, she voted in favour of an amendment to the smoking ban that would have allowed separate smoking rooms. She subsequently voted against plain packaging, and I think she also voted against the ban on smoking in cars carrying children, so her response to a generational tobacco sales ban is entirely consistent.

Sunak, on the other hand, simply wants to leave a legacy. Sometimes this is no bad thing. In this instance, however, targeting smoking smacks of opportunism bordering on desperation, and it’s not a good look.