Last chance saloon - why classical liberals must support Truss and Coffey

According to the Guardian the Government is not in a hurry to publish its long-awaited tobacco control plan.

Insiders also say there is “no chance” that recommendations to reduce smoking that the ex-Barnardo’s chief executive Dr Javed Khan made in a government-commissioned review will ever be acted on.

See Thérèse Coffey to drop smoking action plan, insiders say.

I’ve written about the Khan review several times, noting the scandalously one-sided nature of the process and what Chris Snowdon called his “crackpot” ideas.

I’ve noted too how in recent weeks the tobacco control lobby has been getting increasingly twitchy about the new PM and her deputy, the recently appointed Secretary of State for Health, Thérèse Coffey.

Today’s story bears some of the hallmarks of ASH - from the snide references to the fact that Thérèse Coffey smokes ‘and has previously accepted hospitality from the tobacco industry’ to the quote by CEO Deborah Arnott.

A spokesman for the Department of Health doesn’t rule out making ‘progress’ with Khan’s recommendations so my guess is there is a battle going on within the department with, on one side, unelected civil servants with close links to the tobacco control industry, and on the other a principled politician who is trying to stay true to her anti-nanny state beliefs.

How that will resolve itself I’ve no idea but what is clear is that genuine liberals should support Truss and Coffey because the alternative - under a Labour or yet another Conservative leader - is almost certain to be more of the same nanny state paternalism that has dominated UK politics for decades.

There are bigger issues of course, notably the economy, but pushing back on unnecessary government intervention in our daily lives is important too and this may be the first time in decades we’ve had a PM and Secretary of State for Health who are of similar mind when it comes to less not more regulation and restrictions.

They are of course going to come under immense pressure to impose further measures on consumers and the industry so today's report is merely the first of many shots.

Fresh North East - another taxpayer-funded lobby group - has been active already, tweeting and tagging other members of their circle.

Whether this is a coordinated strategy I don’t know but it’s good to see they’re not happy!

At the same time we can’t be complacent because I’ve seen many times how quickly ministers and governments can reverse ferret. (Remember the smoking ban and plain packaging?)

Btw, I thought about writing to Thérèse Coffey at the DHSC but I have no confidence, if I write to her via email or even by post, that any correspondence from Forest will actually reach her.

That’s how little faith I have in the civil servants at the Department of Health, a conviction hardened by my experience of writing to Javed Khan during the course of his ‘review’.

In a democracy how sad is that? I’ll just have to find some other means of communication. Telepathy, perhaps?

Meanwhile, whatever your reservations about Liz Truss, classical liberals desperately need the PM and her deputy to succeed.

If like me you believe in freedom of choice and personal responsibility (that manifests itself politically with light touch regulation), this could be our last chance saloon because if they are forced out what's left?

A word of warning though. I remember when we thought plain packaging had been kicked into the long grass, only for it to return a year later not on health grounds but pure political expediency.

The same could happen again.

Also, when we have a Home Secretary proposing to make cannabis a class A drug it suggests that not everyone in the Cabinet is completely aligned to a more liberal approach to drugs, legal and illegal.

Nevertheless let's just be grateful for the noises emanating from the DHSC, even if they are driven by malcontents determined to railroad the Government towards a previous PM's smoke free ambition.

PS. I shall be discussing this with presenter Tom Swarbrick on LBC shortly after 4.00pm.

Scotland Tonight

Further to yesterday’s post about the SNP conference and a fringe event about vaping that got cancelled …

You may remember that I was in Glasgow last month having been invited to appear on Scotland Tonight.

Scotland Tonight is a nightly news and current affairs programme broadcast on STV at 10.30pm during the week apart from Thursday when the programme goes out at 8.30pm.

I offered to appear live in the studio on Thursday September 8 but the journey to Glasgow began two weeks earlier when I was contacted by an STV News reporter who explained that they were considering a programme that ‘will explore the Scottish Government’s plans to make the country a tobacco-free generation by 2034’.

In particular, she wrote, the Scottish Government has ‘already said it’s considering a “range of initiatives” to achieve this – which could include a New Zealand-style phased ban.’

At that stage there was no mention at all of vaping. It was first brought up (by me, I think) when we spoke on the phone later that day.

As I remember I mentioned that Forest supports vaping as a reduced risk alternative to smoking although our principal role is to defend the interests of adults who enjoy smoking and don’t want to quit.

Five days later I received an email that asked if I was still ‘happy to join us as a guest live at 8.30pm next Thursday [September 8]’ on what was described as the ‘Scotland Tonight special on smoking and vaping’.

I was keen to be on the programme so I confirmed my participation and said I would travel to the studio rather than be interviewed down the line, which was also an option.

The following week I drove to Glasgow, arriving in good time, but as you may have worked out, and as I wrote here, Thursday September 8 was the day the Queen died.

Within minutes of the announcement of her death I got a call to say the programme had been postponed.

Six days later I received another email:

Apologies about last week’s programme – I’m happy to let you know that we’ll be broadcasting this programme on Thursday 22 September at 8.30pm. We would still really like for you to be on our panel if possible. I understand that Glasgow may not be possible, but depending on where you are based we could either get you into one of our studios or have you join us via Zoom/Skype.

I had to be in Birmingham that day so I offered to do the interview from a studio in the city, a suggestion they subsequently agreed to and confirmed.

Two days before the rescheduled programme I had a five-minute chat with someone on the programme who wanted me to remind them of Forest’s position on smoking and vaping.

Then, 24 hours later, I received another email to say the programme had been ‘pushed back a week again’:

It’s a knock on effect of the Queen’s death and a network special is going in our slot. I’ll be back in touch when I find out a confirmed date for this to TX, but otherwise, we won’t need you this Thursday. Thanks so much for your flexibility on this and apologies that it’s been so on and off.

In response I said I couldn’t do the following Thursday (September 29) because I’d be in America but I’d be available after that and ‘happy to come to Glasgow’.

So when was the twice postponed programme finally broadcast? Why, on September 29, when I was attending the Global Tobacco and Nicotine Forum in Washington!

I know I couldn’t expect them to delay the programme again just for me but that’s not the half of it because the broadcast programme was significantly different to the programme that was originally scheduled for September 8 and September 22.

It was no longer about the ‘Scottish Government’s plans to make the country a tobacco-free generation by 2034’. Instead it was almost exclusively about vaping and the potential threat to young people including schoolchildren and the studio guests were now Sheila Duffy (director, ASH Scotland) and Mark Oates (director, We Vape).

When I queried this, after watching the programme the day after my return from Washington, they replied:

We decided to have our panel centred around vaping rather than smoking as we had made changes to the package, and felt the panel should reflect the debate around vaping rather than smoking.

Fair enough but what’s not clear is why they made changes to the package in the first place. What happened after September 22 that led to a significantly different programme being broadcast seven days later?

On August 29 STV News reported that the rise in the number of young people vaping is a 'disaster in the making' but that was a month before Scotland Tonight broadcast its programme on vaping.

It makes no sense to me why, a month later, a current affairs programme that began as an exploration of the ‘Scottish Government’s plans to make the country a tobacco-free generation by 2034’ should change tack and focus almost exclusively on vaping or, to be more accurate, fears about vaping.

This, btw, is the report STV News posted online on the day the Scotland Tonight programme was broadcast:

Scotland Tonight: Scottish Government urged to take action to regulate vaping amid addiction fears (STV News)

Read it and you probably don’t need to watch the programme. The content and tone are pretty similar.

As for the original plan, discussing the Scottish Government’s smoke free ambition, that seems to have been consigned to what used to be called the cutting room floor.

Is it unreasonable to ask why?

Free speech and harm reduction sacrificed on the altar of petty doctrine

Say what you like about the Conservatives but at least they don’t cancel conference events when challenged by partisan lobby groups.

At the SNP conference in Aberdeen a fringe meeting was due to take place tomorrow on the subject ‘Embracing Alternatives to Smoking in Scotland’.

Supported by Japan Tobacco International, participants included a representative of JTI plus Daniel Pryor (Adam Smith Institute), the IEA’s Chris Snowdon, Luke McGarty (Scottish Grocers’ Federation) and two SNP MSPs.

However the event has now been ‘axed’ following a complaint by ASH Scotland, a lobby group funded almost exclusively with taxpayers’ money that probably wouldn’t exist if it had to rely on direct donations from the public or the private sector.

Why they weren’t told to bugger off I don’t know but just as in England, where ASH Scotland’s London counterparts have a close and in my view unhealthy relationship with government, tobacco control campaigners in Scotland enjoy similar influence with those in power.

Now we see one of the many outcomes. An event designed to highlight the potential benefits to consumers of reduced risk nicotine products has been cancelled, apparently at the behest of an anti-smoking pressure group that, you might think, would support a public debate on this issue.

But no. ASH Scotland, like so many tobacco control groups, is so driven by its hatred of the tobacco industry that it can’t see the bigger picture - a world in which current smokers have switched (voluntarily) from potentially harmful combustible products to equally enjoyable smokeless devices.

Who manufactures and profits from those devices ought to be irrelevant but many anti-smoking campaigners have been indoctrinated by history and won’t let it go.

But I think ASH Scotland’s opposition to the meeting in Aberdeen also comes down to something else - fear of losing control of the debate - because, make no mistake, this is all about control.

ASH Scotland has been the loudest anti-smoking voice in Scotland for decades but since vaping came along the group has seemed surprisingly out of touch, even Luddite, in its attitude to vaping.

Ten years ago in England ASH CEO Deborah Arnott appeared almost equally sceptical about e-cigarettes but I’m guessing she saw the way the wind was blowing and quickly adapted.

Within a year or two ASH (London) had embraced vaping - at least as a short-term quit smoking aid en route to giving up nicotine altogether - and today ASH itself is embraced as a go-to source of information on vaping. Quite an achievement.

Personally I find it a little hard to stomach but I can’t deny how successful it has been in terms of reinventing ASH for the 21st century and prolonging the group’s life for decades to come (by which time Deborah’s successors will no doubt be campaigning to reduce vaping rates and lobbying government to target a ‘vape-free’ England by 2070.)

In contrast, instead of welcoming a discussion about vaping and harm reduction, ASH Scotland chooses to maintain its influence by challenging the SNP to cancel a legitimate public debate on the spurious grounds that the meeting is in breach of WHO rules.

Or, as the Sunday Times Scotland put it:

Japan Tobacco International was scheduled to co-sponsor a fringe event tomorrow until Sheila Duffy, the charity’s chief executive, warned that the attendance of tobacco industry representatives would breach World Health Organisation rules that forbid elected representatives from meeting tobacco firms, their associates or vested interests to discuss health policy.

Sacrificing free speech and arguably harm reduction on the altar of petty doctrine is an interesting policy in a free society but nothing surprises me about the tobacco control industry, far less ASH Scotland.

PS. See also how Article 5.3 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control was used to block a requested meeting with Dr Javed Khan, author of the Khan review - Article 5.3, the DHSC and the ‘independent’ Khan review.

As I wrote in that post, Article 5.3 was never meant as a blanket ban on interaction with the tobacco industry or groups (such as Forest) that receive funding from tobacco companies.

If governments are serious about harm reduction they must reject the constant misrepresentation of Article 5.3 and get round the table with all interested parties including the tobacco companies and consumer groups funded (shock, horror) by Big Tobacco.

Rod Liddle and the stopped smoking brigade

It’s October which means that Stoptober, the annual stop smoking campaign, is once more upon us.

A few years ago, via a series of freedom of information requests, Forest tried to find out how ‘successful’ Stoptober was in terms of persuading smokers to quit.

The results, it’s fair to say, were inconclusive partly because they kept changing the KPIs (key performance indicators).

We also enquired about the cost of the campaign, which ranged – if I remember – from £400,000 one year to £1.2m the next, or vice versa.

Controversially perhaps the cost included payments to various celebrities to promote Stoptober.

In 2015 comedians Al Murray, Rhod Gilbert, Shappi Khorsandi and Bill Bailey were together reported to have been paid £195,000 by Public Health England.

Since then the money spent hiring celebrities such as Strictly’s Craig Revel Horwood has been significantly less but it still adds up.

This year Stoptober is supported by Martin Kemp (ex-Spandau Ballet and EastEnders), singer Sinitta, who also helped promote the 2021 campaign, and James Jordan, a former professional dancer on Strictly.

Not every Stoptober celebrity ‘ambassador’ has given up completely however. Cricketer Phil Tufnell, for example, says he still enjoys the occasional cigarette.

Some will say this shows how hard it is to give up but for every ‘failed’ quitter there is arguably someone who stopped smoking overnight and never touched a cigarette again.

One of them is our old friend Rod Liddle who quit exactly one year ago and has written about it in this week’s Spectator. According to Rod, 'Binning cigarettes was, curiously, a doddle'.

Good luck to him but I can’t help feeling a little sad that Rod’s decision to stop was influenced in part by some of the punitive or petty measures he railed against for years, such as the cost or 'banning people from smoking in the open air, especially railway station platforms'.

It's silly of me perhaps but 'Smoking is more hassle than it’s worth' reads more like a defeat than a victory, although I take on board the 'two immediate health benefits' he mentions.

Nevertheless, when Claire Fox (now Baroness Fox of Buckley) spoke of “reaching for my fags in defiance” a decade ago, I counted Rod and Jeremy Clarkson as members of the same awkward squad of contrarians who weren’t prepared to be bullied by the likes of ASH.

Clarkson quit smoking several years ago, reportedly on health grounds which you can't argue with. Before that however he seemed to credit the smoking ban for helping him cut down, which was no doubt music to ASH’s ears.

Clarkson has yet to become the face of Stoptober and I hope he never does. Ditto Rod, although part of me thinks it would be quite funny if the pair of them were to front next year’s campaign.

Liddle and Large. That would be some team. In the meantime here are some of my favourite moments involving Rod in relation to Forest and/or smoking.

One was when he joined our table at the Savoy Hotel for a gala dinner organised by Forest and Boisdale to mark one of the last evenings diners could eat, drink and smoke in a restaurant before the introduction of the smoking ban on July 1, 2007. He subsequently wrote:

Spent a wonderful valedictory evening chain-smoking at a bash organised by Forest on Monday night ... There were some fine speeches – pugnacious and rabble-rousing from Anthony Worrall-Thompson; politically-loaded and sharp from Andrew Neil; counter-intuitive from the excellent Claire Fox.

Another was his hilarious interview with a councillor in Stony Stratford, Buckinghamshire, whose bid to ban smoking in the town centre was making headlines nationally and globally. It's no longer online but Rod spoke for many when he asked, "Is this man a halfwit?".

A third was his speech at the Forest Freedom Dinner in 2016. Guido Fawkes called it “the best political speech” of the year. Another guest said it was "the best after-dinner speech I've ever heard" and The Spectator published it online, in full, here.

Another piece by Rod, published by The Spectator to coincide with the tenth anniversary of the smoking ban in July 2017, is behind a paywall but the headline speaks for itself – 'Being anti-smoking damages your mental health'.

Five years on I’m very happy for him if he feels healthier for not smoking and doesn't miss it, but – a small plea – don’t become an anti-smoking bore, Rod. I couldn’t bear it!

PS. According to the Daily Mail, ballroom dancer James Jordan quit smoking to honour his late father’s dying wish.

Addressing a Forest meeting at the Conservative conference in Birmingham this week, Claire Fox told the audience of her own father’s dying wish.

It was, she said, not for his daughter to quit smoking (as the rest of her family hoped) but for her to switch to a ‘low tar’ brand of cigarette because, as a smoker himself, her father knew she would never give up because he understood how much she enjoyed it.

Many would dispute whether switching to a 'milder' brand is significantly beneficial but as Claire also pointed out:

"This is my life, not your life. It's my life and whilst I'm a free person I will do things that none of you would approve of, probably. But that's the way we get along in a democratic free society. I don't need to be looked after. If I wanted to be looked after by those who know better I'd move to China or some other authoritarian regime."

Above: Rod Liddle at the Forest Freedom Dinner in 2016 and, below, 2017

Another senior moment

I sometimes wonder whether I should be allowed out.

As I get older there is rarely an event or function where I don’t momentarily embarrass myself. Usually it’s something I say or blurt out but occasionally it’s something else.

This week at the Conservative conference in Birmingham it was a combination of the two.

What happened was this.

I was walking through Brindley Place, just outside the International Conference Centre, where all the restaurants are, when a familiar face walked past me.

He was in a hurry but he saw me, smiled, and said “Hello, Simon” as he walked past.

It was hearing my name that discombobulated me. And his face, as I say, was very familiar.

I knew this man, and he knew me. I could have responded with a wave or a brief acknowledgement and kept walking but a voice in my head said it would be rude not to stop and have a quick chat.

So I turned and called after him. “Hello!”.

He stopped. I moved towards him. We shook hands. And then, the horror!

The face was familiar but my mind had gone blank and I realised I had no idea what his name was or even how we knew each other.

“I’ve just seen the xxx team,” he said, referring to a company he knew I would know.

That only made things worse.

How did he know them? Did he work in that industry? Was he a former employee?

I grasped the nettle. “Where are you working now?” I asked.

He mentioned a certain city and suddenly the fog in my brain cleared. Not only did I remember his name, I remembered - too late - that he’s a member of parliament.

Damn and blast.

What followed was a bit awkward as I tried to dig myself out of a hole of my own making but what made it worse was that I really like this MP, even though I don’t know him personally.

He has a ready smile, always appears cheerful and upbeat, and seems to work extremely hard as a constituency MP, three traits I admire enormously.

So I’m annoyed with myself but what’s done is done. He won’t be the first person to think I’m an idiot but I hope he will forgive my senior moment.

Have the Tories lost their bottle?

Here's the video of our fringe event at the Conservative party conference on Monday.

I chaired the session and the panellists were Baroness Fox (aka Claire Fox, Academy of Ideas), Mark Oates (We Vape) and Chris Snowdon (Institute of Economic Affairs).

(As I explained in my previous post Mark was a late replacement for Lord Moylan.)

Here are some soundbites:

Chris Snowdon on health inequalities

"The whole issue of health inequalities for years has been used as a cover for imposing the lifestyles of the upper middle class onto ordinary working class and low income people."

"I don’t have the answer, and nor does anyone else, how you can make everyone’s circumstances better, but you’re not actually helping people who are in bad circumstances by taking away the things that are making their life a little bit better every day."

Mark Oates on Britain becoming 'smoke free'

"People should be free to smoke if they so choose but government is doing a bad job of letting people know that vaping is vastly safer than smoking."

"In order to achieve what they call ‘smoke free’ you need as many options as possible. It’s not a one-trick pony. I’m a big supporter of vaping but vaping doesn’t work for everyone."

Claire Fox on poverty

“Poverty is grim. It’s bloody grim. If the energy that was put into stopping poor people eating the wrong food and smoking was put into building a productive economy that might mean that people were less poor we might get somewhere."

Finally, another quote from Claire and possibly my favourite of the afternoon:

“I’m on the left and I’m far more pro-freedom than anyone I’ve met in the Conservative party ... What has happened to you lot? You’ve lost your bottle, in my opinion.”

She’s right, I think. An 80-seat majority yet the Tories have indeed lost their bottle, from grassroots to government, on a whole range of issues.

What a waste.

Conference call

Just back from the 2022 Conservative conference.

The first Tory conference I went to was in Brighton in 1984, the year the IRA bombed the Grand Hotel, killing five people and injuring 31.

As I’ve mentioned before I was in the hotel just two hours before the bomb went off in the early hours of the morning.

The next day I was in the conference hall when Mrs Thatcher arrived to give her scheduled speech. What an ovation she got.

In those days there was virtually no security. You could walk in and out of the conference centre and the main conference hotels (the Grand and the Metropole in Brighton) without being checked, but it all changed after that.

For almost three decades now we’ve had secure zones, airport style security and armed policemen.

But over the last 15 years an even bigger change has happened. The so-called fringe - hundreds of events organised by special interest groups including Forest - has moved centre stage.

Back in 2005, when we hosted our first party conference event (starring David Hockney) at the Labour conference in Brighton, fringe events weren’t allowed to compete with the official programme in the main hall.

The official programme usually began at ten and continued until five with a break for lunch so fringe meetings could only take place outside those times or during the lunch break.

In Birmingham this week the official programme in the main auditorium has been restricted to just a few hours in the afternoon and from what I’ve seen the hall has been pretty empty.

Fringe events meanwhile start at 7.30 and continue all day and well into the evening and the competition to attract an audience is immense.

Once inside the secure zone delegates are reluctant to leave it during the day because it means queuing to re-enter followed by a further security search but hosting a fringe meeting inside the secure zone costs thousands of pounds.

The last time the Conservatives were in Birmingham, in 2018, we hosted a couple of back-to-back meetings at Austin Court, a small conference centre a short walk from the International Conference Centre.

(Austin Court was also the venue for the inaugural Freedom Zone that Forest launched in partnership with The Freedom Association in 2008, but that’s another story.)

Four years ago Austin Court was a lot cheaper than being inside the secure zone (and I'm sure it still is) but the number of people who came was quite small - not disastrously so but small nonetheless.

This time therefore we bit the bullet and paid for a session in the Think Tent marquee.

Located just inside the secure zone (in Birmingham delegates have no choice but to walk past it), the Think Tent is a joint initiative launched a few years ago by the Institute of Economic Affairs and the TaxPayers Alliance.

It was worth every penny. Superbly organised by Sara Rainwater of the TPA (others may have been involved but Sara was our principal contact), many of the logistics were taken out of our hands which made it a relatively painless experience.

There was a bit of late drama when one of our panellists, Conservative peer Lord Moylan, dropped out on Friday, but within hours we managed to get an excellent replacement - Mark Oates, director of We Vape.

Mark was on honeymoon in a mountain villa in Santorini when we contacted him but 72 hours later he landed in Birmingham. Now that’s what I call dedication.

I chaired the event and the other panellists were our old friends Claire Fox (aka Baroness Fox of Buckley, above) and Chris Snowdon (IEA).

Prior to the event I was a bit concerned about how many people might come but I needn’t have worried. The location undoubtedly helped but I’m fairly sure our panel was a draw too.

Anyway the marquee was pretty full, which was good news.

I was very happy too with the panel which was arguably our most entertaining since Brighton in 2005 when our speakers included David Hockney, Joe Jackson and Daily Mirror columnist Sue Carroll (who sadly died in 2011).

Also on that panel was Claire Fox who is possibly even more outspoken now than she was then.

“I’m on the left and I’m far more pro-freedom than anyone I’ve met in the Conservative party,” she told our Tory audience on Monday. “What has happened to you lot? You’ve lost your bottle, in my opinion.”

I’ll post a few more soundbites plus a video of the event later today.

Final point. We tried very hard to get an anti-smoker on the panel – if not a prohibitionist then someone who at least supports the Government’s smoke free ambition.

No joy. Including MPs, they either declined our invitation or ignored it.

As a general rule I like to have a balanced debate with speakers representing both sides of the argument.

After Monday’s event I’ve changed my mind. Why give these fuckers the time of day? They won’t share a platform with us so why bother inviting them?

Either way it’s a lot more fun without them.

Forest on the fringe

I’m on my way to Birmingham where Forest is hosting a fringe event at the Conservative party conference.

It’s a panel discussion on the subject of smoking and prohibition, which is probably not the number one issue on everyone’s mind this week so I’m a little concerned about the attendance.

We’re in the Think Tent marquee which is just inside the secure zone outside the International Conference Centre so that should help, but we'll see.

The Think Tent is managed by the Institute of Economic Affairs and the Taxpayers Alliance - who are hosting a series of events including interviews with the likes of Jacob Rees-Mogg and Kwarsi Kwarteng - and we’ve booked a one-hour slot from 3.15 to 4.15 tomorrow (Monday).

We lost a panellist on Friday - Conservative peer Lord Moylan had to drop out - but Mark Oates, director of We Vape, came to the rescue and stepped in to replace him. We may have another panellist to announce tomorrow as well.

In the meantime, apart from Mark, the panel features our old friends Baroness Fox (aka Claire Fox), director of the Academy of Ideas, and Chris Snowdon, head of the Lifestyle Economics Unit at the IEA.

We tried very hard to get a prohibitionist on board but without success.

My guess is that prohibitionists don’t want to admit they support prohibition but, more generally, it’s a fact that tobacco control campaigners - including most anti-smoking MPs - are incredibly reluctant to share a platform with their opponents so they decline or, worse, ignore our invitations to speak which says more about them than us, I think.

Anyway I’m in the chair so I’ll try and play devil’s advocate as best I can to make up for their absence.

If you’re at conference, come and join us. (Refreshments include wine, beer and biscuits.) If not, I believe you can watch the event online. I’ll post a link tomorrow.