Report to the People
27th November 2006
Age
of Reason
What’s the worst mistake
you’ve ever made? Buying that
timeshare while on holiday and on the wrong side of a jug of sangria?
Putting money on Manchester United to win the Champions’ League?
What about starting smoking?
Most smokers want to quit and
wish they’d never taken up the deadly habit. And they certainly don’t want their children following in
their footsteps.
We know that the younger you
start smoking, the harder it is to stop. And
so it was to help prevent children from making this lethal mistake that I
secured an amendment to the Smoking, Health and Social Care Act to give
Ministers the power to raise the minimum age at which tobacco can be purchased.
I was therefore delighted at
the news last week that experts which Ministers were consulting on whether to
use this power have come out in favour of raising the age from 16 to 18.
On receiving the experts’
report, Health Minister, Andy Kerr, declared that the necessary regulations will
be drawn up and put before parliament within a matter of months - a huge relief
after, as you will have read in your Telegraph
last Monday, some frankly disgraceful behind-the-scenes political posturing
had threatened to block the move.
Like any health reform, this
is not a panacea. But, every time
it prevents a child buying cigarettes and saves them from a life of tobacco
addition, it strikes another blow against the chronic public health problems
which have blighted Scotland for too long.
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