Clause 12 - Enforcement
Tobacco Advertising and Promotion Bill
9:45 am
Mr Kevin Barron (Rother Valley, Labour)
I welcome you to the Chair, Mrs. Adams, on this last day of our proceedings. On enforcement, may I first say to the hon. Member for Meridian that it is not exactly true that the Bill represents a big shift in what trading standards officers have to do, or that it creates is a completely new situation. The so-called voluntary codes have to be policed somehow, and policing fell on many occasions to local authorities trading standards departments.
In 1994, it was decided to take tobacco advertising off shop-fronts, where it was soon replaced by Coca Cola adverts as far as I can remember. It was also decided to remove tobacco advertising from billposters in close proximity to schools. There is evidence, therefore, that some local authorities have acted as a type of police to ensure that the voluntary codes were adhered to.
As regards enforcement, the contents of the clause are not dissimilar to those in the Food Standards Act 1999. I chaired the pre-legislative Select Committee that considered that Act before its Second Reading. We took a great deal of evidence from different parts of the country from trading standards officers—or weights and measures, as the hon. Lady calls them. Different parts of the country have different forms of enforcement in relation to foods standards. It was quite clear that what was needed in that Act—I suspect that this is also the reason for provision in the Bill before us—was a power for someone to be able to take over if it were found that the trading standards authority, or other relevant local organisation, was not capable of doing a job that would give meaning to the Act in their particular area.