Until very recently, accusing an anti-smoking campaigner of being a prohibitionist was considered to be a low form of character assassination. The suggestion that someone who despises tobacco might secretly harbour the desire to ban it would be met with earnest protestations that this was an hysterical libertarian fantasy, nothing short of scaremongering from the tobacco industry. They would swear on a stack of Bibles that they wanted nothing more than another modest piece of tobacco control legislation and that the right of adults to buy cigarettes was not in question.
That all changed on Tuesday when Rishi Sunak announced that the right to buy cigarettes is going to be gradually wound down. Anyone who becomes an adult after 2026 will not have it. Eventually, no one will. This represents a fundamental change in the British Government’s approach to tobacco, which for decades has been disapproving and interventionist but ultimately tolerant of those who decide, despite the risks, that they want to smoke.
The nanny state is an insatiable beast. It cannot be appeased, and it is not just smokers who should be worried about Sunak crossing the Rubicon. Vapers are now an obvious target, of course, but drinkers should also be vigilant. By making the unthinkable suddenly possible, Sunak has given hope to every brand of fanatic. After the tobacco ban was announced, the Health Foundation said that the Government “should learn from tobacco policy and take bolder steps to prevent poor health from other leading risk factors such as alcohol and junk food”.
The steps proposed by other parts of the nanny state lobby include putting photos of diseased livers on wine bottles and introducing minimum pricing, a policy already in place in Scotland. Politicians in Westminster have so far resisted calls for tobacco-style regulation of alcohol, but their views will be gradually weakened if there is a global health push for an alcohol control treaty.
In his speech, Sunak tried to put a firewall between smokers and drinkers by saying that “unlike all other legal products, there is no safe level of smoking”. But this doesn’t wash with some public health campaigners who deny the health benefits of moderate drinking and insist that there is no safe level of alcohol consumption. In Canada, there’s even talk of reducing recommended drinking guidelines to no more than two drinks per week!
Meanwhile, “ultra-processed food” is portrayed as inherently dangerous and sugar is described as “toxic”. Big Alcohol and Big Food are the new Big Tobacco. In the eyes of the zealots who control the public health narrative, tobacco, alcohol, gambling, vaping and processed food are all addictive and deadly and therefore fair game.
They will chip away at them with incremental regulation until prohibition becomes politically feasible. One consequence of Sunak’s tobacco ban will be to make such regulation seem moderate by comparison. If you complain about the rising tide of anti-alcohol legislation, you will be reminded that you are lucky to be able to drink at all.
Like the anti-smokers before them, the new wave of killjoys will deny that prohibition is their aim, but why would anyone fall for that again? Those who agitate against alcohol, gambling and e-cigarettes use exactly the same tactics and rhetoric as the tobacco control lobby. They burn with the same fanatical fervour. Try asking them what it would take for them to stop campaigning. Ask them what success looks like. Many won’t be able to tell you. Or rather they won’t want to tell you. But it won’t be much different to what Rishi Sunak announced last week.
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