Clause 1 - Rates of tobacco products duty

Part of Finance Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 10:00 am on 6 May 2004.

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Photo of David Laws David Laws Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury 10:00, 6 May 2004

May I press the Economic Secretary on the need for a joint inquiry with the Department of Health? Although his models indicate that, if you reduce the price of tobacco, you will increase the demand for it in the short term, they have to be set against the fact that many other EU countries with far lower tobacco taxation and prices have far lower

tobacco consumption. That may indicate that factors other than price and taxation are more important in the long term.