Clause 6 - Specialist tobacconists
Tobacco Advertising and Promotion Bill [Lords]
11:30 am
Mr Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham, Conservative)
I fear that I am going against the Minister's request for us to group all our points together.
Perhaps I could reply to the Minister's response to my initiation of a clause stand part debate. As my hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne said, we have identified yet another undefined ''in case'' subsection, the most far-reaching and abusive example of which we shall consider under clause 7. The Minister said that the clause was a proportionate response, but she went on completely to ignore all the practical points that I made about when the accounting period starts and fluctuation in the mix of sales, for example. That shows that the provisions in the clause are tokenism, and that no regard has been taken of the mechanics of bringing the clause into effect and the effect that it will have on practitioners.
The clause does not provide any clarity. If I were a specialist tobacconist as defined under the clause, I would not know whether I was coming or going, which my hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke said was the response of his specialist tobacconist. The clause will cause much confusion.
The Minister said that special dispensation is being made for specialist tobaccos because the market for those is predominately adult. The market for any product under the Bill should be adult because a person must be aged over 16 if he or she is to smoke.
The amendments that related to specialist tobacconists and mail order lists were concerned with only specialist tobacco products, and particularly cigars, and specifically stated that people must be aged over 18 and that they should be treated as adults for the purpose of retailers' mail order prices and lists. Retailers derive much of their income from mail order because they are specialist, few in number and often difficult to reach. It was inconsistent for the Minister not to accept amendments that related to what she admitted to be an adult market, but to give special dispensation under the clause. The Government are being entirely inconsistent, which will result in a mess, and the Minister was unable to give us any reassurances.
I shall not force a vote on the clause so that we may move speedily on to consider other clauses. However, the more we debate the clause and the more the Minister takes us round in circles with her inadequate responses, the greater the confusion among retailers and the potential number of challenges in the courts. That is exactly the chaos and confusion that it is the
job of members of the Committee and other hon. Members to avoid by making the Bill clear and fair, which I fear is not true of this clause.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 6 ordered to stand part of the Bill.